What I have learned about submitting to publishers and writing competitions – Part One

Avoid the pitfalls and increase your chances of success

Photo by Etienne Girardet on Unsplash

Last week, my first New Year’s piece here at Writing Talk was about attitude - the ways that we can build the resilience and persistence into our writing practice through small, positive habits.

This week, in the first of a two-hander, I’m dwelling on something more prosaic - the hard-nosed reality of pressing Send and submitting work to a publisher or a writing competition.  

I’ve submitted work many, many times over the last decade, since I decided to stop messing around and become a serious writer. Before that I was a dabbler, a dilettante, easily put off by rejection, or worse, indifference.

My first attempt at getting published was (surprise, surprise) a rejection. A flash fiction story - a bit earnest, a bit overwrought - that later got published in a small online magazine which no longer exists. But I still remember the thrill of the acceptance. Since then, I have won a number of competitions, been published in more than 60 literary magazines or anthologies, won or been shortlisted for many prestigious lit competitions, had work commissioned, won grants and awards for my writing. I don’t say this to brag, but to demonstrate I know something of the process.

I’ve also been at the other end of the telescope. I’ve judged writing competitions, been the editor of a small literary magazine, and read entries for various short story competitions. I’ve compiled and edited several short story anthologies. I’ve also curated work for community arts projects.

This means I’ve read hundreds of flash fictions and short stories, and learned there are many talented writers out there who understood the submissions process and rules, send in their best work, and are humble, whatever happens. It remains a privilege to be entrusted with people’s work, not least because I know how hard it is to send stuff out, make yourself vulnerable, get rejected, and go again.

But I have also been amazed at how many people sabotage their chances of being published through laziness, sloppiness or plain arrogance. Often it is down to making avoidable mistakes or just not doing that final edit - you know, the final edit you need to do after the one you think is the final edit. I’ve rejected many good stories because they mis-read the submissions guidelines, or didn’t bother to read them at all. A significant few were rejected because they’ve clearly decided submissions rules are for losers (which is ironic...)

I should ‘fess up at this point and admit I’ve made many of the same mistakes. I have sinned. I am flawed. So, here are some observations, some guidance, some holding your hand to the flame of my own bitter experience, which I hope will help you stand a better chance in finding a home for your stories.

Stick to the rules – even if they seem dumb
If a magazine or competition say they don’t want your name on the same document as your story (because they want to give everyone a fair shot through anonymous judging), then don’t take that as a signal to pop your name in the header. And the footer. And give yourself a by-line. If a competition says use this font and that spacing setting, then do it. There’s a good reason, even if it seems unfathomable to you. And stick, religiously, to the word count, don’t think ‘What’s a few extra/dozens/hundreds of words between friends?’

Don’t - and I have encountered this more than once - send through multiple stories and simply ask the judge/editor/reader to ‘select the one you like’. I guess some people think literary magazine editors or competition readers, lounging on their golden thrones and snorting caviar with all the time in the world on their hands, won’t mind getting a smorgasbord of your best offerings. Truth is, it’s guaranteed to get you binned, unread.

And don’t get into a numbers game mentality. Instead take your time to research and read a publication. Use search engines to read previous winners of a writing competition, if possible. Invest in some research.   

Keep it lean – don’t bloat your story with description or weak dialogue.
If I had a dollar for every time I have read a story where dialogue is just used for clunky exposition, then I would have much dollars. Maybe you’ve heard one of those so-called golden rules which says a story has to have dialogue. What they didn’t add was, “not at any cost.” If there is dialogue, it should not be pure exposition, a kind of phoney dialogue (no I don’t mean phoney as in using the phone, you know what I mean. Dialogue should always be doing some heavy lifting, conveying character mood, raising tensions, hinting that what’s being said is not what’s being meant.

Keep it lean - don’t overcrowd with characters
Irish literary giant Seán Ó Faoláin once said a short story is to a novel what a hot air balloon is to a airliner. Like the plane, the novel takes time rise off the ground, and carries many people a long way to the final destination. Short fiction is more balloon-like - taking off quickly, carries a small number of people and lands nearby. In other words, less is more.

Edit, don’t chop
I have read submitted stories which stop, mid-sentence, at the end of the word count. The author has simply chopped the end of the story off. No, I don’t know what that’s all about either. Most good stories have a natural length, that you can probably reduce with some judicious editing. But the point of editing is to make the story sing, not chop off the final chorus.

Don’t mess your opening
The number of stories I’ve read as an editor or judge which should actually begin one, two three paragraphs after the opening that’s been written is startling. You don’t go to a concert to hear the sound check and the singers warming up with vocal exercises, you go to hear the performance. Stories that do this often have a great start hidden a few paragraphs in, but by then it is too late.

Don’t mess up your end
I’ve read many, many stories which start well, develop in compelling way, and then end like a dancer shuffling around to the last bars of the music with their hands in their pockets. Apologetic and uncertain. Worse still are the ones which just give the reader a throwaway ending, which says to that reader “folks I didn’t really know how to finish this, so I’m just gonna pop in some half-arsed filler.” What that says to a publisher or competition reader is that you don’t really ‘know’ your story, what it is really about, or at least the effect or tone or style you want to achieve. There doesn’t have to be a Joycean epiphany at the end of your story, it doesn’t have to end with a bang, and certainly not with an unearned surprise. but it does have to end satisfactorily, not fizzle out.

Here's a quote from the ever reliable and insightful Writing in the Dark with Jeannine Ouellette which relates well to this:

Perhaps the hardest thing of all is to write a truly satisfying ending—one that is both surprising and inevitable, as the best endings are….be sure you have done the full work of discovering the aboutness of your story or essay before you try to write a good ending. Often, the trouble with endings is the result of not just the ending itself, but also the prose that precedes it. Has the ending been fully earned? Have you planted enough breadcrumbs on the path through the forest to establish that “inevitability,” while holding enough back to create real surprise or at least revelation? You cannot answer these questions until you have wrestled long and hard with the aboutness of your piece and settled the score with enough confidence to deliver not only a beautiful ending, but one that is fully deserved by all that comes before it.

That’s it, for now. I will post the second half of this next time.

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