The Trophy and the Horse
Thursday September 29, 2011 • Howard Tayler

If you followed my last blog entry, Venturing into New Territory, you may be interested to know that Clarkesworld rejected my story. Here is the (slightly redacted, I'll explain in a moment) rejection letter:

Dear Howard,

Thank you for the opportunity to read [title redacted]. Unfortunately, your story isn't quite what we're looking for right now. Each month, we receive hundreds of submissions and while I may like many of them, I can only publish twelve of them per year.

In the past, we've provided detailed feedback on our rejections, but I'm afraid that due to time considerations, we're no longer able to offer that service. I appreciate your interest in Clarkesworld Magazine and hope that you'll keep us in mind in the future.

Take care,

Neil Clarke
Publisher/Editor
Clarkesworld Magazine

Yay! A trophy!

I could probably turn around and post this story for you folks and generate some quick coin, but my friend Eric James Stone had a better suggestion. He pointed out that the Writers of the Future contest for this quarter ends this Friday, September 30th. He even went so far as to ask the organizers if I'm eligible. Here's the email I got from Eric an hour or so ago:

Howard,

Here's what Joni had to say:

He certainly does qualify. We've had journalists win the contest, we've had
Hollywood screenwriters enter the contest, so we can certainly have graphic
novelists enter.

The fact that we are a prose contest is the definitive line here. Journalism
is one thing, short science fiction/fantasy is another. Comics are something
altogether different.

So he should submit right away!!!!

That's pretty much what I figured, but with more exclamation points.
 
--Eric
 
So I submitted my short story to the Writers of the Future contest. I suspect the competition will be every bit as stiff as the slush pile at Clarkesworld. And since it's an actual  contest, my name isn't attached to the story for the judges. Such fame as I may or may not have is irrelevant. This is why I redacted the title of the story from the rejection letter trophy above -- I don't want to inadvertently disqualify myself.
 
When a horse throws you, sometimes the best thing to do is get right back up on the horse. It might teach the horse that you mean business, but it definitely teaches you that.
 
One more thing: while I do plan to let you know how this particular adventure turns out, know that I will not be updating this blog with every event related to the prosaic (hah!) things I do.