Wednesday, April 1, 2009

I Wish This Were an April Fool's Joke

Really, I do.

When I started my writing adventure, I was fond of markets that accepted simultaneous submissions. I was unpublished and desperate. I think I've been cured, once and for all, of that fondness.

I had a piece accepted by a market today that I pulled from said market over a month ago. My withdrawal letter evidently slipped between the cracks in the InterwebTM, so I had to write an apology and pull the story from publication.

I feel stupid and ashamed. I'm done with simultaneous submissions. Period.

Except for novels, that is. Except for novels. Having more than one offer for one of those would be akin to a thermodynamic miracle.

Yes, the Morlocks are from The Time Machine. If you've never read the book, I highly recommend it. Download the text for free at Project Gutenberg. Reading the book will help you understand my Wiki / Morlock comparison.

8 comments:

Jamie Eyberg said...

That stinks about the withdrawal letter slipping through the cracks. I am not sim subbing anymore either, my fear is that they would accept my story on the same day.

Have a great April.

Cate Gardner said...

But at least they said yes... I must admit (novels aside) I've never sim subbed anything.

Fox Lee said...

You're not stupid, the internet just went wonky on you! I've had similar things happen, so I understand why it gets under your skin.

Aaron Polson said...

Jamie - yeah. I've had it happen before, but not with these consequences.

Sheesh.

Aaron Polson said...

Cate - I think I'm done. Really. Until next time.

Natalie - *shakes fist at the internet*

Robert said...

You'll crawl back to simultaneous submissions one of these days. They ALL crawl back ...

You shouldn't fee bad, Aaron. At least YOU know you pulled the story; it was their fault for not catching the withdrawal.

It's happened to me before too. But luckily I still had the withdrawal e-mail in my sent folder and forwarded it them, so at least they could see I did in fact do the proper thing.

I actually prefer simultaneous submissions. Life's too short otherwise, especially with some of these markets whose shortest response times are 300 days. I actually stay away from places that deny sim subs, unless their response times are reasonable and I think the story has a good shot.

K.C. Shaw said...

Once you recover from the (misplaced!) guilt, you'll probably feel pretty darn good. That must be a good story!

I have resorted to simsubbing from time to time, but only in the case where the first market was taking way too long to get back to me.

BT said...

I'm with Cate, I've never sim subbed. I think it's because I'm too scared of the possible consequences.

I like the impetus I get from sending all my work out to individual markets and then having to write something new for yet a different market. It drives me forward.

But novels must be sim subbed, even the agents suggest it.