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This is a story about following your own path and not letting the boring old farts get you down.
Getting published is a VERY tricky game. The first few years I started out I waded in total obscurity against the overwhelming waves of rejection. Lit journals and MFA programs would have you believe theirs is the only route to publication, the golden path to publication, the high muck-a-muck judges of literary quality. And they made it fairly apparent (without ever writing a response to my submissions) that traditional publishers aren't interested in what I write. Even more, I'm certainly not willing to jump through all the hoops needed to make them care. But no one ever accused the bastions of status-quo for having vision. I'm stubborn. I think I know everything. Even though I know that I do not, I haven't figured out a way to stop myself from acting like I do. So if they weren't going to open their minds, I was going to do it myself. This site was a key turning point.
I originally started this site as part of a two-pronged approach:
- to continue to try and get published by the traditional method of cold submissions to staid lit journals (which only constrain originality through their meat grinder, assembly line processes)
and - shameless self-promotion / self-publishing (which lacks credibility because everyone assumes that if it's not professionally printed, it can't be any good.)
After about three years of following these two paths, here are the results:
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Traditional Route: Yeilded some 30 rejection letters and no publications in any lit journal of any reputation, 0 acceptances by a publishing house (large or small) or lit-agents. Save for UofC Press, none of the rejections from any of these institutions had comments of any useful substance. Half of the form rejections received didn't even reflect the work I'd sent in.
DIY Route: This website, along with Red Fez, which I set up to promote other underground, under-recognized authors, gets upwards of 8000 visitors a month. A young woman in Ohio contacted me about using my play, Rex Redidified, for her Grade 12 drama project which was performed in January 2005. A theatre company in Australia also contacted me about the possibility of producing Red Redidified. Several small print mags invited me to submit to their publication and I was published in two of them. I was invited to join the Underground Literary Alliance where I met loads of other cool indie authors (and a lot of not-so-cool status-quo flunkies...not members), published my novella (which I actually made money on and has gotten very good reviews) and am currently publishing my novel, Game Quest, which has actually generated a lot of interest. I've also been published, horror of horrors, online! A major no-no for any 'serious' author. Apparently, serious authors, to quote Kafka, should 'lay down like a dog and die.'
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I've pretty much stopped submitting to mainstream lit journals and publishing houses. I do so every now and then on a lark, mostly for a rejection letter I have yet to collect. But they are increasingly all the same, so even that fun has gone out of it.
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