The Spirit of Submission
And the Law of the Land
Today I was on a call with a colleague and we noticed that next week, as in the week that comes after this one—this very week we are living in right now that contains today!—on the calendar, contains April 15, the midpoint of April (and also tax day, sort of). I know today is only April 5, but we’re already within a stone’s throw of mid-April and that is terrifying. You know what they say: Time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana. That’s what my dad says, anyway. A++ Dad humor right there.
I am going to open today’s article with a publishing joke. If you are an author or an aspiring author, I must warn you: This joke may make you uncomfortable, perhaps even very uncomfortable. But I’m going to tell it anyway. I’ve been working in the publishing industry for seventeen years now and this joke never fails to slay a colleague. Here it comes. Prepare yourself. Short and sweet three-word joke:
Authors can’t read.
That’s it; that’s the whole joke.
Now, I hate to explain a joke. I believe if you have to explain a joke, it’s not funny. The exception to this rule is if you tell a very unfunny joke on purpose and then laugh at your own unfunny joke; then, you can take this line of humor even further by explaining the unfunny joke to ensure your audience sees they did not miss anything, the joke really was unfunny. For instance, consider this birthday card Shelf Bro and I once gave our dad (sorry to keep harping on my dad today): The outside of the card had a black-and-white photo of a rhinoceros. The front of the card read, “Dad, You Look Great.” The inside of the card was blank. The more I tried to explain—through tears of laughter—why it was so funny, the funnier it got.
That said, I’m going to go ahead and explain why “authors can’t read” is the funniest publishing joke there is:
Obviously, authors can read because they can write; a person who cannot write is usually not an author (with few exceptions).
Although we have definite proof they understand written language, they are incapable of reading instructions.
I’m sorry authors, but, on the whole you’re just very bad at following written instructions. I’m sure all the authors reading this (none, because authors can’t read) are thinking “not me, I read and follow instructions” but if that’s true, if you’re not kidding yourself, you’re in the minority. Not all authors, okay? I said the thing. But in the aggregate, authors are incapable of reading, comprehending, and following instructions.
A person who is an author is not incapable of following instructions in all aspects of their life as far as I know. Remember, most authors are not full-time, for-a-living authors. I’m sure in other areas of their life they see instructions and read them and follow them correctly. Authors assemble IKEA furniture, right? They install software? They microwave food?
Authors, are you out there making Hot Pockets?
But as an employee at a publishing company, I have seventeen years’ worth of empirical evidence that no matter how simple, how clear, how obvious, how unmistakable you make an instruction—many authors simply will not follow it. If you ask them about it later, they will have no recollection there even was an instruction. As an example, this is a transcript—paraphrased—of a conversation I had recently:
Editorial Office: Hey a lot of authors are doing [redacted], can you add a universal proof note for them to check it and fix if needed?
CF: That note is already on all the proofs.
EO: Can you make it more prominent?
CF: It is at the top of the first page in red, boldface type, underlined, all caps, 15-point font.
EO: Can you make it flash?
This behavior is not unique to authors. Lots of people cannot or do not follow instructions they are given. People are impatient. You don’t need to tell me; I’m impatient as they come. However, I write Shelf Life for the writers, authors, and aspiring authors (mostly?) so I’m focused on authors not following instructions.
I am telling you this hilarious story about how authors can’t read for a good reason. When you do any of the following things:
Submit a story to a contest.
Submit a short story to a magazine.
Submit a poem to an anthology.
Submit a query to an agent.
Submit a book or book proposal to a publisher.
You will encounter instructions on how to do that thing correctly. “Correctly” is subjective but in this case it means “in the way that the person or people receiving your submission want you to do it.”
I know from my many years of experience in this business, that is, the business of being on the receiving end of manuscripts, and from speaking to my colleagues far and wide, that many people doing any of the above things do not follow the instructions laid out for submitting. This is like a universal thing. Every editor at every level of seniority I have ever met who receives manuscripts over the transom (unsolicited) complains about the submissions they get that don’t adhere to standards.
We ask for certain elements to be included (eg, your bio, a logline, a synopsis); those elements are missing.
We ask for certain formatting; that formatting is not used.
We ask for metadata (eg, story or author information) to be provided; it is not provided.
We ask to receive the submission a specific way (email, mail, form); it arrives some other way.
We ask for a specific file type (eg, doc, docx, pdf); we receive some other file type.
We have a word count limit; the submission comes in over the limit.
And so on and so forth. Now, I can’t say what authors are thinking when the above things happen. I know they’re honest mistakes sometimes; we all make those. But I suspect that author hopefuls don’t always understand the ramifications of not following the instructions which range from “your manuscript will experience a delay while we sort this out” to “submission instructions were not followed so we trashed the submission unread.”
(A caveat to this is when you pay a submission fee; that fee may cover editorial office support that helps collect the missing pieces of the submission, or reaches out to the author and asks them to correct their submission, if necessary. A submission fee or reading fee is not always a sign of a scam.)
This is the critical information I am trying to impart: Submissions get rejected for publication because the submission instructions were not followed and so nobody ever read the submission. Publishers do not necessarily read every submission. Publishers throw out submissions unread for all kinds of reasons and one of those reasons is “this author can’t read.”
I know from the state of the self-published rack on Amazon that people believe their work is just so good that it does not matter how they offer it to the intended audience or how poorly they present it. Surely, if the story is good, people will look past the poor presentation and see it is a gem and they’ll buy it or accept it anyway. This is not true. Every reputable publishing company, literary agent, magazine, anthology, and contest has more submissions than they know what to do with. They are not hard up for submissions to read.
Let me give a parallel example that I think many people can relate to, which is, resumes. I have been a job seeker and a hiring manager both far too many times for my taste. I do not like trying to get a new job and I do not like hiring new employees but sometimes I have to.
If I put out a job ad and I get ten responses (this has happened), then I have the time to consider each application, resume, and cover letter carefully. I can really read them in-depth, compare the candidates, and consider all angles. When this has happened, I don’t need to be an absolute stickler for typos, for instance. Are you supposed to make sure your resume doesn’t have a typo on it? Yes, of course, but sometimes we all make mistakes.
If I get one hundred or more responses to my ad (this has also happened), then I need to triage more efficiently. Cover letters addressed to “Ms Forest” (my last name has two Rs) or “Mrs Forrest” (rude) or that have the job title or our company name wrong, or resumes that have a typo, are going right in the trash. If our application package asked for two references, a salary expectation, and the date you can start and you didn’t include one of those things? Right in the trash. In this scenario I can still only give my attention to ten candidates so I have to effectively weed out 90 percent of the responses and hope I end up with the best ones.
Publishers and agents are always in the latter scenario. They are always getting more submissions than they can reasonably read. If they know they can handle 100 submissions, they’re not going to take the first 100 they get and give all those their full attention. They’re going to discard all the ones that don’t follow the guidance first and review the 100 that are left over.
The same advice applies to this as when you are applying for a job. Try to get the hiring manager’s name and address your cover letter to them directly; follow all the instructions in the job ad and application; don’t leave any requested materials out and don’t submit anything they didn’t ask for; apply by the deadline if there is one; triple-check your resume and cover letter to make sure you’ve updated them to apply to this job and that they don’t have another job title or company name in them somewhere.
Likewise, when you submit a manuscript, it’s better to begin your cover letter “Dear Ms Forrest” than “Dear Editor” (but “Dear Editor” is better than “Dear Ms Forest” or “Dear Mrs Forrest”) Follow all the submission guidelines carefully. Send what is asked for and do not send extra stuff to be helpful—if an agent wants a synopsis and first ten pages, don’t be extra helpful and send your whole manuscript. Don’t send a submission or query while the publisher or agent is closed to subs and queries. If you reuse a cover letter, make sure you update all the variables.
Before I sign off, I’ll share specific items to watch out for when you are submitting.
Publishers, magazines, and anthologies usually specify how they want the manuscript formatted (font size and face, line spacing, indents, et cetera). Follow their guidance or, if they do not give any guidance, Shunn manuscript formatting for fiction is a safe bet.
Some publications want the submission to be blind, meaning your name and identifying details should not appear anywhere in the manuscript file itself. If this is requested, make sure you take your details off the first page, out of the running headers/footers, and out of the file name as well.
Submit using the method the publisher or agent requests. If they want submissions through a web form, use their web form. If they want you to use a platform like Submittable, use it. Do not try to bypass their preferred submission method and send an unsolicited email. If they want you to submit via email, read carefully to find out whether they want the manuscript pasted into the body of the email, attached as a file, or both. (I have seen all three.)
Submit the file type they request. Microsoft Word Document (.docx) and Microsoft Word 97 - 2003 (.doc) are not the same thing and some publishers request one or the other. Some publishers take all kinds of file types and some publishers are very specific. Definitely do not submit a PDF (.pdf), a Scrivener file (.scriv), a Pages file (.pages)—or Lotus Words, or MacWrite, or WordPerfect—unless the file type is specifically allowed. Sorry nerds, same goes for LaTeX. For the love of dog, do not send a link to a Google document.
Submit all the materials requested and only the materials requested. By materials I mean things like your author bio, a logline, your Twitter handle, your website, a link to Shelf Life, a photo of yourself, your CV, the full manuscript (for a novel), and so on. Don’t neglect to include any of the requested items in your submission package, and don’t include anything extra.
If you’re including a cover letter (not all publications accept them), follow any guidance offered on what should be included in your cover letter. Some agents, editors, and outlets specifically say what to put or not put in the cover letter. If there’s no guidance offered, it doesn’t hurt to be short, sweet, and to the point. Thank them for considering your submission.
Do not submit a manuscript that doesn’t meet guidelines. I mean the manuscript itself. If it doesn’t fit the topic of the current call for submissions; if it’s in a genre this agent doesn’t rep; if the submission guidelines say “stories between 1000 and 7500 words” and yours is 7517 words; if it’s fiction and this publisher only publishes nonfiction—if the manuscript doesn’t fit the bill, don’t send it to this person or publisher.
Time is precious, don’t waste it. See also: bananas.
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Really no LaTeX? All these obscure formatting rules, and ban the one tool that can make sure everyone actually follows them consistently? Have they no love for ligatures?!