So: You wrote a short story.
First of all, congratulations. A finished manuscript is a triumph, no matter the length. Novels are not the only manuscripts that deserve celebrating. I sometimes say in here that most people never write a complete novel in their lifetime, and that’s true, but most people never write a whole short story, either.
Based on my experiences of people telling me about their desire to write a novel, memoir, or story (people are compelled tell you these things when they hear you work in publishing), many many people feel that they have a story to tell but don’t follow through on telling that story. Everyone has their reasons, but I often hear that people feel they’re missing some skill or credential that they need to write their story, or that they’re not sure what the purpose is of writing that story if they don’t intend to become “professional writers” and sell stories.
If you’ve written a complete manuscript—whether that’s a flash story, short story, novelette, novella, novel, trilogy, quadrilogy, septology, or what have you—you’ve joined a rarefied company of story finishers and I’m proud of you.
When folks write a novel, they often have in mind what might happen to that novel when they’re done writing it—what the future of that story will be. It ends up on bookshop shelves, if you’re lucky, and maybe the New York Times bestseller list. Many people know this happens through finding an agent and then a publisher. People are also often aware that, if they choose not to go that aforementioned route, they can self-publish that novel and release it on their own. They might not have all the specific details going into the endeavor—don’t worry, there are Shelf Lifes to fill in all those blanks!—but I believe, for many people, the path forward with a finished novel is apparent.
The future of a completed short story is sometimes less obvious to those who are new to the world of publishing. I know this based on the number of people who ask me (and ask in forums and groups I belong to) whether they can self-publish their short story on Amazon just the same way as they would a novel. The short answer, by the way, is yes—there’s no minimum word count requirement on KDP, so in theory you could publish a short story on KDP and people do publish short fiction on KDP all the time. So there’s one thing you can do with your finished short story, I guess.
Today’s Shelf Life, and next Tuesday’s Part II, are about several methods of publishing a short story. The intended audience is anyone who has completed a short story and are unsure what their options for it are, or for anyone who is thinking about getting into writing short fiction and would like to know more. These articles are not about how to write a short story, which would be several Shelf Lifes unto themselves, because a short story is its own literary form and not a shorter version of a novel. Also, though I write short stories, I can’t offer much advice on that topic because I’m not actually very good at it. But if you’ve already written one (or maybe you know how and you just haven’t gotten around to it yet) and you want to know about publishing it—these Shelf Lifes are for you.
First, a word about word counts and terminology: Different types of short fiction are usually characterized by their word count, and it helps when looking for a publisher to know exactly what you have on your hands based on that publisher’s word count limits. For instance, consider these as general guidelines:
Microfiction—1 word to 300 words
Flash fiction—301 words to 1,000 words
Short story—1,001 to 7,500 words
Novelette—7,501 to 17,500 words
Novella—17,501 to to 40,000 words
Novel—More than 40,000 words
Those are not set in stone, though. A publisher of short fiction may take only stories up to 3,000 words, or 5,000 words, for instance, or may characterize anything under 1,500 words as flash, or have other guidelines.
Also, keep in mind that anything under the length of a novel might be characterized as “short fiction”—this term is usually inclusive of novelettes and sometimes on novellas as well. “Short fiction” and “short story” are not synonymous; a short story is one type of short fiction. Flash fiction, likewise, is often considered a subtype of short stories and microfiction is often considered a subtype of flash fiction.
So, again, you’ve got some completed short fiction on your hands. What can you do with it?
Publish It in a Periodical
Periodical refers to a magazine or newspaper published at regular intervals. It’s a publication that comes out over and over again. For instance, the New York Times, the New England Journal of Medicine, and Time are all periodicals. Costco Connection is a periodical. Probably not one you dream of selling your short story to, but a periodical nonetheless.
There are many periodicals that publish short fiction, including many that do nothing but publish short fiction. These periodicals range from very well-known magazines that anyone might know, like the New Yorker with a circulation over 1.2 million, down to small, online-only magazines that only short fiction aficionados might know, like the Santa Fe Literary Review, an annual publication of Santa Fe Community College.
When you publish your short fiction in a periodical, you can expect your readership to be the subscribers to that periodical in all its forms. This is valuable because even small magazines have some built-in readership that stories will reach. Further, to be eligible for certain literary prizes—I’m thinking of the Pushcart, which is a major prize in literary short fiction—a story must be published by a literary magazine or small press.
Many periodicals pay authors for short fiction and many do not. Those that do not pay cash may offer authors another form of payment, such as free copies of the issue their story appears in or a free subscription to the periodical. Many paying markets pay a rate by the word (for instance, five cents per word or ten cents per word) and many others pay a flat fee per story (for instance, $100 per story).
To submit your story to a magazine, you first need to find one that is accepting submissions (that is, not temporarily or permanently closed to submissions) of the type of story you’ve written. For instance the New Yorker accepts fiction submissions. That’s it. No word count limit, no excluded genres, no note that they accept unpublished fiction only. They’re not very specific. Clarkesworld Magazine, on the other hand, accepts submissions between 1,000 and 22,000 words, or fantasy and science fiction only, in English, that have not been published before (first rights must be available). Further, Clarkesworld does not accept simultaneous submissions, meaning that when you submit a story to them you agree not to submit it anywhere else until you’ve received a disposition from Clarkesworld.
Once you’ve chosen the periodical (or periodicals) to which you will submit, you should carefully review their submission guidelines. These guidelines will tell you how to format your story; where to send it for consideration; and what you should include with your story, if anything (like an author bio or cover letter). After submitting, you wait to hear from the editor of the periodical whether they accept your story for publication, or reject it. If they accept it—congrats! You’re all done and they’ll work with you from here to publish your story. If they reject, move on to the next periodical. There are hundreds or even thousands of them out there looking for short stories to publish—and they’re not the only markets in town.
Publish It in an Anthology
Your next option is to publish your story in an anthology, or a collection of literary works selected by the anthology’s editor (this person may also be called an anthologist). Anthology also implies that the works therein are unrelated to one another, although they may share a common topic or theme, and written by different authors. (A collection of short stories all by one author is usually referred to a “short story collection” as opposed to an anthology.)
Anthologies differ from periodicals in that they do not publish on a regular, recurring schedule. Many anthologies are one-offs, meaning the editor collects the short stories and compiles them into a volume that is published once and then never again. Anthologies may also publish on an annual or other basis; for instance, the Best American Short Stories is a long-running anthology series that publishes one volume (that is, one collection or book) annually and has been running since 1915.
Anthologies tend to put out a “call for submissions” when they open to receive submissions; collect submissions for a period of time; and then close permanently to submissions and select stories for the anthology from what they collected during the open window. (Periodicals, on the other hand, may open and close on a set schedule, remain open permanently, or open when they need stories.) For example, here’s a link to a submission call that is open during December 2023; I’m including a screenshot as well, for posterity.
You can see in the screenshot that the call includes important submission information such as:
Who is editing the anthology.
What types of stories they are looking for.
When the submission window opens and closes.
How much they are paying for stories.
Submitting to an anthology is much like submitting to a periodical. You follow the guidelines set forth in their call for submissions, submit your work, and then wait to hear whether your story was accepted. While periodical editors often (but don’t always) review submissions on a rolling basis, it’s not unusual for the editors of an anthology to wait until submissions are closed to begin making accept decisions—don’t expect an answer before the call for subs is over!
Publishing a short story in an anthology or a periodical is, in essence, the trad publishing of short fiction. The Big Five publishers aren’t really involved, but in this method the author grants rights to an editor and publisher—the folks who publish the periodical or anthology—for their (the author’s) story to be included in the issue or volume, and the author then benefits from the arrangement either through monetary compensation, or through accessing the periodical’s or anthologist’s reading audience, or both.
There’s one more trad method of publishing your short story remaining for us to discuss, plus the self-publishing options for short stories. I’ll continue with those in next Tuesday’s Shelf Life.
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