My latest submission to The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction has been out 17 days.  Doesn’t sound like long for a postal sub, but my previous F&SF have taken 10 days, 8 days…and that’s it.

Only two prior submissions to F&SF.  What’s wrong with me?  Sure, I like e-subs for their convenience, but this is F&SF for pity sake.  They passed on “Leech Run” and an old novelette that I’ll one day novelize, E&P.  But that’s it.  At least that’s all my records show, and I didn’t record anything to Duotrope about either of them.  It’s been over two and a half years since I sent them anything.

I find this tough to believe, honestly.  My record keeping has gotten better of late but I could easily have missed a sub or two, especially if I considered them impossible sales.  But to not even try?

There was a time when I heard a heartbreaking stat about Gordon Van Gelder only buying like three stories from slush ever.  But that shouldn’t stop me from collecting rejections from them.  Heck, I haven’t sent them GB or EE or TOL or any of my other stories making rounds. I didn’t even send them my 1500-word fart joke, “Excuse Me”.  It’s possible that I sent them “Chasers”, a story I sold back when I was just starting to keep records.   (I’m thinking of sending that one to Escape Pod once I hear back on “Leech Run”…but that’s another post.

More and more I am realizing that the person who has stood in my way of becoming a professional writer is me.  So while I hope that this delay from F&SF could mean good news (not necessarily a sale, but a rewrite request or just a nice personal rejection would be lovely), I’m going to start creating a target list for markets and prepare submissions for those targets ahead of time so I can drop a story in the mail the minute it’s rejected elsewhere.