I didn't have the creative energy to draft a new novel this November, so no traditional NaNoWrimo for me. I was casting about for another idea when a colleague began waxing lyrical about her short story spreadsheet, which she credits with part of the reason for her selection for Odyssey this year.
"I've got one of those someplace," I thought.
It had last been updated in 2015.
Ouch.
I've long had trouble getting short stories out to markets, and it's hard to send stuff out when you don't know what you have. So I spent the first week updating my inventory, and the remainder of the month cleaning up short stories for critique and sending rewritten pieces out to market.
My goal was to send out 30 shorts to paying markets. I fell considerably short of that, but I'm pretty happy anyway.
I was doing pretty well at first, but as rejections began to come back, and as my limited market research ground into "I should read a few of their stories and figure out what they buy" I discovered that the older stories in my inventory didn't hold up to my current level of writing skill. And my current level of skill wasn't quite good enough for some of my favorite markets. Maybe if I re-wrote that story again...
In other words, I slammed into both sides of The Gap as well as Imposter Syndrome. Which was useful information but still frustrating. Even though I knew that was happening, I couldn't make myself send a story I knew wasn't up to par, and I don't have useful market research on second- and third-tier markets.
That said, I submitted a dozen stories 14 times (I submitted two twice, thank you to editors with quick turnaround times!), and took an additional 15 shorts (most of them flash) to Wordos -- wait, and two more to my other crit group.
So I only hit half of my actual submission goal (which was to get 30 stories to editors, not just critiquers) but I did hit 31 stories with other people's eyes on them. That feels... okay? It certainly pushed the bounds of how many characters, plot lines and settings I could juggle in my head at once.
Since 2019 had been a thin year for me -- I'd only submitted shorts for publication 10 times before Nov. 1 -- I more than doubled my submissions in one month. I'm happy with that. And I now have a PILE of crits to work through.
Probably the best payoff of all was the one I hadn't seen coming: my revision speed ramped waaaaay up during November. Given how painful I find editing and revision, I'll call that a win-win.
Hee.
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