I don’t think it’s fair that many publications won’t accept submissions shared on my blog because they reckon they’ve been 
published.
Writing is not only my passion, skill, art, and expression… it’s my release. Prior to kicking off mission ‘share words with the world’ back in September, I suppose I never really considered any of the publisher rules because I wasn’t submitting.
Anyone that practices something daily the way I do is going to get better at it. When I create something new, I can’t wait to share it with my readers. Chances are it’s going to end up getting gobbled up in the archives of my blog and not viewed again until the anthology comes out.
There aren’t many thrills available for a frantic word nerd like myself… no interviews and book signings… no eager agents phoning me up to tell me how brilliant I am… However… all of my ass busting pays off when I check views and see 200 readers checking me out within three hours of posting something.
After my first story was accepted for publication last week, the excitement left me scribbling micro-fiction with a hit of encouragement. I wrote a few stories and picked one that I really liked. However unlike when I share work with YOU, my faithful cult of gretchen’s writing appreciators… there was no thrill in the completion.
Instead of finishing the piece and shooting it out for my REAL supporters to see how I’m progressing, I pasted it into an email to an online literary journal that ‘… usually gets back to submissions within two months.’
So let me get this straight… I’m supposed to wait two months before I’m allowed to promote my own work in case another webpage wants to use it to promote their brand?
No comment.
Here’s something I wrote this morning after dreaming about someone I thought was my friend but stopped talking me for undisclosed reasons.
licking cracked glass after a shattered toast
waking up
speaking your name
like coffee. staining my teeth.
intoxicant. necessary
poison pushing air
outward. inside thoughts.
wishing erased means
invisible. cuts
without scars.
vacant. reminders
tossing sleep. sacrificed
skies. once saved
hearts. pushing… no…
pumping. rotten blood.
infection.
oozing bandages
disposed. like me.
what once
promised.
like
who
i
am.
I don’t understand why most journals won’t accept work regardless of where else it appears. I got into publishing to promote good writers and writing. If a quality piece runs in Bananafish, three other journals, and a personal blog simultaneously, I say: right on. How can exposing good literature to more readers in multiple markets/venues be bad? Are good books only allowed to sell in one bookstore at a time?
Amen brother! Regardless of where work is featured, last time I checked humans can’t really read two different areas at once (like a magazine and webpage). Furthermore, if a Writer is promoting their stuff somewhere besides one particular place that it’s published, you’d think published places would dig it because the author’s readers will follow their work to wherever it’s being published.
… for example I’ve been sending people to Bananafish like it’s my job 😉