Acceptance: Tercie's Final Waltz

My 700 word flash story "Tercie's Final Waltz" has been accepted for the July issue of Golden Visions Magazine. Submitted and accepted within one hour.

The funny thing is, I was planning a blog post in my head about how sick I am of waiting. There's so much waiting in the publishing industry. I look at my submissions on Duotrope, and I'm not even upset until I've had a story sitting at a journal for a year. In fact, I have a story at a market that doesn’t allow simultaneous submissions (meaning they want to be the only market looking at it until they reply). About a month ago, they contacted me after having had the story for a year to tell me that it's in the maybe pile. I didn't think I'd hear from them. I'm waiting on it now only because it's a really good horror journal.

And there's no reason for it. I read slush for a national lit journal. The submissions don't stop. So get caught up and then stay caught up. If 10 subs come in a day, and you read 10, but you have a backlog of 1000, get caught up and you can make same-day responses. It's still 10 a day, regardless! Unless a journal's reply date is constantly backsliding, they're reading at a rate of what's coming in, they're just keeping a buffer of however-many months.

Why?

Because writers allow it. Because until recently, we had no choice.

Previously-published stories certainly give a collection street cred. I hope to include a good number in each of the three mini-collections I release within the next half year or so. But if publishers aren't going to catch up with us, they're going to be left behind.

So a big thanks to Golden Visions Magazine for being so on top of their game. They do it right.