Moving to Chicago Mood: …

Moving to Chicago Mood: Vaguely happy, with a dash of eh, why not?

Last night was a phone call night. I did go do that chat with Datlow (moderately amusing, especially when lovely Barth Anderson asked Ellen what she thought of the new markets like Strange Horizons, etc.), but not long after finishing that, Kirsten called. We ended up talking for two hours, in the midst of which, Jed called. So when Kirstie and I finished, around 11 (we had a fair bit of catching up to do), I called Jed back...and then, maybe twenty minutes later, Karina called. So I talked to her until I fell asleep -- at least another half hour or so. I'm a bit groggy right now. But I feel better for talking all this stuff out -- it kind of amuses me how differently I talk about it to different people, though. Karina in particular -- she went out with Kevin too, she loves him, she understands how he can drive a girl crazy sometimes. So I can kvetch without feeling like I'm being unfair to him; she knows just how seriously to take it. Is nice.

Karina described my general mood as being "sunny, with occasional storms." That's probably about right. :-)

I'm kind of itching to write, but sadly, I have homework to do today. So the first task is to figure out what I have due for my renaissance class and do it. Could take an hour, could take six hours. We'll see. I've been a bit of a slacker in that class, so I want to get up to speed again. It makes me a bit stressed and guilty to not even know if I'm behind or not.

Once the homework's done, I really owe Duncan that revision of "Kathryn", so that's next on the agenda. Hopefully that can get done today too. And once that's done, well, I ought to do the POD book, but I may write or re-write a story instead. We'll see. We're probably talking about tomorrow by now, though.

In other news, "Sister Mary" came back from The Atlantic with a nice note from C. Michael Curtis, which kindly pointed out the flaws in the story. I pretty much agree with him, but rather than fixing them, I'm sending it out again, to The Georgia Review. The problem is, I'm not sure I know how to fix them. Irritating. Left in the position of hoping someone buys it anyway. Eh.

I think I'm revamping my submission strategy. My current plan, after talking with Paul, is to:

  • a) first submit to a few high-profile places: definitely The Atlantic, possibly The New Yorker, etc.
  • b) submit to a few of the literary markets who don't accept sim subs, like The Georgia Review
  • c) finally, do a mass submission to all the decent literary markets I know of (perhaps in batches) that do accept sim subs (like Five Points and Black Warrior Review)
We'll see how that works. I'll feel muchly validated once I manage to sell *something* to one of these markets. I haven't yet. I'm a little afraid of remaining in the erotica ghetto (much as I love erotica, I don't want to be condemned to only publishing it for the rest of my life).

I have to get on the ball, though, 'cause a lot of these places don't read over the summer. Some stop reading at the end of March! Very frustrating. Darn academic schedules. Stupid grad students. :-)

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