Jack of Harts

Another story I wrote has been accepted today.

I’ve submitted a total of nine stories for publication this year, and six of them have been accepted for publication. Now to be clear, that is an absolutely amazing record.

Three of the submissions were completely new works, of which two were accepted, which is another completely crazy record.
Two of the submissions were what I call heavy rewrites, where I take a previously written story and adapt it to match an open call that they don’t quite fit, but will after the rewrite. One of them was selected, so I call that a very good use of time.
Four of the submissions were previously written stories that were rejected by other anthologies that I sent, mostly untouched, to another anthology. Three of those were accepted and I’m waiting for word on the fourth. That is amazing.

Now every submission I must format to the submission style they want. But pretty much all publishers tell you what they want. So I take my base story file, save a file for THAT anthology, and go do the things they want. Then I send it to them and they get to see a story hopefully formatted the way they like, assuming I understood their directions correctly. Its easy to do that formatting using modern word processors, so that’s one of the quickest steps for me.

Six accepted stories, two rejections, and one waiting to find out, is an absolutely incredible success rate in my humble opinion. And to be clear, these are all stories that will pay. Different publishers pay in different ways, so some of the payment I will see at different times and in different ways, and these aren’t “buy a house” money. More like “buy a meal” money. But the more stories you have out in publication, the more money you get coming in. And someone finds one story you wrote that they like, and they go off to find the others. That’s what we like to call the snowball effect.

This is a very good start to the year for me as a writer, and I can now say that I’ve been picked for publication by six different publishers, in addition to the books I’ve self-published. So six different groups of people that are not me have chosen to publish my stories. Some are Jack of Harts science fiction stories. Others are Captain William Carter stories Wyrd West stories. It’s a good mix, and I rather like seeing so many of my favorite characters getting out where other people can read them.

It’s the year of the horse, and I celebrated it by freshening up one of my stories featuring Leroy with a bit more oomph. He head butts riders off their little ponies, screams challenges to everyone, and kicks his enemies with silver-shod hooves. He laughs at those who think they can stand against him, and then demands head scritches from his rider who is clearly designed to provide that needed service to the best warhorse in the wild wild West. It was a fun story to freshen up and I love it even more now than when I first wrote it.

I submitted another story today, this one is about Mishipeshu, the Chippewa guardian spirit of Lake Superior. Who usually manifests as a a Great Lynx or an underwater Panther. I went with the idea that the explosion of the Independence in 1853 was the work of Mishipeshu, and went from there. The story flowed as it usually does for me, from a single idea and starting point, into a series of events that became a story, and I didn’t know if I had the full story down until I came to the end. And when I found that end and looked back, I knew I had a story I was happy to have written. Now it is off into the ether and I am happy. I hope the people who get it like it.