I'm Illustrating J.M. Munsil's Poem

I have another photo illustration accepted. Haruah has accepted, “Silent Upon the Grave.” This picture is going to illustrate J.M. Munsil’s poem, “Speak to Me.”

This photo was taken with the plan to send it to Haruah when the time was right. It is a picture of a statue out on Moores Creek Battlefield. The statue is of a woman and it is placed upon a hill. Behind the statue, if you stand downhill, are trees with Spanish moss hanging from them.

I have liked Spanish moss since my trip to the south when I was 13 years old. So this scene really intrigued me.

I’ll let you know when it finds publication.

Inquiring about "Home and Home Again"

My fiction piece “Home and Home Again” has been out to Xelas Magazine now for 98 days. According to Duotrope (a great place to find places to submit to), the average time for this magazine to respond is 65 days. Xelas states that if they have had a story for 90 days that we can write and inquire about it.

Well, I did just that last night. It is usually a good sign when a magazine doesn’t get back to you right away. However, it could just mean that a hard heartache is coming soon. I remember when it took Gambara a long time to get back to me. I kept waiting and waiting. About the time I was going to send them an inquiry they wrote me. And told me that my piece made it into the final reading. So close, but they still rejected it. In fact it was this same story, before the re-write and name change.

I’ll let you know what they saw, when I hear back from them.

I also sent an inquiry letter to Dicey Brown last night as well. Their average response time is 76 days and my story has been there for 97 days. I went to find out how long to wait for. When I clicked on them through Duotrope, it said in a big yellow box not send them anymore submissions as they are closed for submissions. This was a little scary, but nothing too much. Sometimes magazines to do that in order to catch up on their slush pile (in fact Gambara did that for a little while). But then when I tired to get into their link to read about when I can inquire, there was nothing there. This scares me. Know I wonder if the magazine is no more.

I went through my sent email box and found the address I submitted the story to and emailed them an inquiry. I don’t know if I’ll hear back from them or not. But if I do, I’ll let you know.

“Home and Home Again” is also still out to 42opus and Armada Quarterly. Both for 27 days. 42opus’ average response time is 69 days, while Armada Quarterly’s is 11.

Illustrating my own Story?

Well as you know, I have had my first story accepted. It is still a thrill to think about. That night, Dan mentioned about illustrating it. I told him that I had thought about it, but I didn’t know how. I have no idea where a psych ward is.

He told me to take a picture of the letter. Referring to the letter the mother wrote in my story. Thinking it a great idea, I laid their in bed thinking of the best way to do it and how to lay everything out.

The next day, I took time to write my letter out, after making some pretty stationary on the computer. I then rounded up an envelope and some coins. Waiting to add some more color to the picture, I also grabbed one of my silk red roses and a pink flower.

I then cleared the table and brought in an extra light and clicked away. By the way, I love digital cameras. I don’t have to wait to see how my pictures turned out and I can see if I have the one I want or if I need to take more.

Well, I finally chose which picture to send into Haruah to illustrate, “A Mother’s Love,” and they accepted it! I will be illustrating my very first published story.

The illustration, “A Mother’s Love Letter,” was submitted on Feb. 10, 2007 and was accepted two days later.

"A Mother's Love" is going to be pu......

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness! And no I’m just not repeating Annie to repeat her. I just can’t believe it! What news.....

We will bring you back to your regularly scheduled news in a moment.

July 4th weekend of 2005, Mike from Liberty Hall held a 500 word story challenge. Every story submitted had to be 500 words exactly. I took the challenge and from the trigger wrote “A Mother’s Love.” From that point this story has had four re-writes.

I sent this story to The Pedestal on May 22, 2006, but they rejected it 37 days later.

It then went to Haruah on July 10, 2006. After ten days I was told that they weren’t interested in it as it was. They would like to see a re-write. Since that was doing our no home time during our moving transition from NYC to Burgaw I didn’t get back around to that re-write for quite some time. Finally on November 6, I sent Haruah my re-write. However, I got the same response 65 days later. They liked the story, but it was still too rough, but they would take another re-write.

I struggled with their suggestions. It seemed like, to me, that they were split themselves on how to fix it. Half said one thing and the other half had other suggestions.

I loved the wording of my story and didn’t feel comfortable changing it. I did change some of the beginning paragraphs around to help smooth out the rough edges. I emailed the editor for some more feedback, like she said I could. The next day I went back and tried one of the suggestions. Someone had suggested splitting up the letter the mother was writing. At first I didn’t like the idea for I liked the flow of the letter. But I took a chance and split up the letter. And you know what....I liked it!

I submitted my story back to Haruah (on February 3rd) for the third time and emailed the editor to never mind the first email.

Dan’s youngest sister called tonight and I was telling her about NoteBored/Liberty Hall’s new magazine and how I wanted to help. But I couldn’t because I didn’t think my critting skills were strong and I didn’t have a publication credit.

Well, I can’t use the last statement anymore

Now to bring you back to your regular news program.....

I’m going to be PUBLISHED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Haruah accepted “A Mother’s Love”!!!!!!!

I’m so HAPPY.

And now they are a paying market. I am getting $10 for my story.

When I started to write I wanted to beat my husband in getting published. Well, he beat me in the non-fiction world, but I beat him in the fiction world.

I’m so happy. I called my husband first thing and then I called Deanna, the owner of The NoteBored.

The writing community of Liberty Hall has what they call pips for awards. If you will challenge you get one and if a story which started there gets published you get a gold star. I’ll be running over there soon to grab my star!

The Continuing Journey Continues

My story continues to continue its long path to light. Written for one of NoteBored short story challenges, “Aftermath of War” has gone through several re-writes, a name change, and has had several rejections.

Before its name change, “Aftermath of War” visited:
Happy-11 day rejection
Haruah-12 day rejection
Bewildering Stories-1 day re-write
Gambara-126 day rejection
The King’s English-25 day rejection
Plunge-111 day rejection

After its name change, “Home and Home Again” visited:
Bewildering Stories-2 day rejection
The Pedestal-28 day rejection
Literary Mama-64 day rejection
Four Volts-8 day rejection

I sent my story out to Xelas and Front Porch Journal on November 9, 2006. The next day it went to the mailboxes of Eclectica Magazine and Dicey Brown. On November 15th, GUD and Fiction Warehouse received my story. And the last places I have sent my story out were 42Opus and Armada Quarterly on January 19, 2007.

Eclectica Magazine rejected “Home and Home Again” on December 3, 2006
[quote]
Dear Joy,

Thank you for your submission to Eclectica Magazine. After careful consideration, we have decided not to select it for publication. There are many possible reasons for why a particular piece isn't selected, and I regret that we are unable, given time constraints, to offer further explanation as to which of those reasons applied to your work. I will say that you're in good company; as always, there were many authors and many pieces that we would have liked to include.

Best of luck with your writing and in finding a home for this work. We appreciate your support of online literature in general and Eclectica in particular, and we hope you'll try us again in the
future.

Sincerely,
Tom // Eclectica
[end quote]

I got two rejections on January 7, 2007.

Front Porch Journal
[quote]
Thank you for submitting your work to Front Porch. We regret not being able to accept your work at this time and we wish you the best in placing it elsewhere.

Sincerely,
The Editors
Front Porch
www.frontporchjournal.com
[end quote]

Euphony
[quote]

Dear Joy,

Thank you for sending us your story "Home and Home Again." I'm afraid we will be unable to use it. We receive many stories and must often decline accomplished writing.

Yours with best wishes,
John Robert Martin
Fiction Editor
Euphony
[end quote]

GUD rejected it on January 19th
[quote]

Dear WJoy,

Thank you for sending us ""Home and Home Again"". Unfortunately, it's not what we're looking for at this time.

Best of luck with this piece in other markets,

Sincerely,

Sal Coraccio
Greatest Uncommon Denominator Magazine
http://gudmagazine.com
[end quote]

The last rejection this story received was from Fiction Warehouse on February 2, 2007
[quote]
Joy:

Thank you for your interest in Fiction Warehouse, but at the present time, we will not be able to feature "Home and Home Again." We regret that your story doesn't suit our present needs. Please know that we receive many more submissions than we can use, and our needs do not necessarily reflect the quality of your work.

Best of luck in placing this story elsewhere, and we look forward to reading more of your work in the future.

Wayne Gunn,
Managing Editor

Fiction Warehouse
http://www.FictionWarehouse.com/
[end quote]

Most of my recent rejections have been form ones. I had been doing so well at getting personal ones.

So the most current string of rejections are:
Front Porch Journal-59 day rejection
Euphony-59 day rejection
Eclectica Magzine-23 day rejection
GUD-4 day rejection
Fiction Warehouse-20 day rejection

I’m still waiting to hear from:
Xelas-92 days and pending
Dicey Brown-91 days and pending
42Opus-21 days and pending
Armada Quarterly-21 days and pending

Xelas is of the time that I can now write them and see what the status is with my story. I think I’ll give it a few more days and then I’ll email them and find out. I hope that the long wait means good news.

But I thought that with Gambara once, too. Gambara almost did publish this story, but it failed in the last reading. That was a heart breaker.

So if you lost count there – in all I have 14 complete rejections on this story. I was told by another writer that the stories average around 20 rejections before they are accepted. I guess I’m almost there.

I’ll let you know about more rejections as they come in.