Earlier this year, after a 10-year hiatus, I began trying to find homes for my short stories, and a lot has changed during the last decade. For one thing, Ralan.com has bitten the dust, so I’ve had to find an alternative means of finding potential markets for my fiction. The best Ralan alternative I’ve found so far is The Submission Grinder. If you are looking for open short fiction markets, it’s a great first point of call.
Finding a replacement for Ralan, wasn’t as difficult as I’d anticipated, but I was shocked when I noticed how much the fiction market has changed. It used to be that editors were mainly interested in finding the best stories for their publications. These days, there are a lot of markets that appear to banging a political drum or stating they only accept submission from those of a certain demographic. I find this annoying. When editors judge stories according to how good they are, the cream should rise to the top. When stories are published because the author profile ticks the right boxes, this may not be the case. I don’t see this as a step forward.
On a more positive note, I was relieved to see most publications make it clear they do not wish submission that have been produced by AI. Unfortunately, many would-be “writers” appear to be submitting AI-created works anyway. I recently visited one online publisher’s website and discovered it had shut up shop. This was partly due to the owner’s worsening health, and also because, although they made it clear they did not want to see any AI-created fiction, people were constantly bombarding them with poor-quality stories that were obviously produced in this way.
AI is a problem that’s unlikely to go away. Although genuine writers are creative people who love to craft stories, there are plenty of people who have zero creativity or talent who dream of becoming famous writers. Years ago, these people used to source fiction from writers available to hire via freelancing platforms, such as Guru.com or Freelancer.com, and then publish the fiction they purchased as if it were their own. These days, the same people are probably trying to get famous by using AI prompts instead. This makes it harder for the editors at reputable fiction markets, who have to wade through all the trash. It also means that writers, of various levels of talent, may also have to compete with any higher-quality AI submission that may slip through the net.
One thing that hasn’t changed is writers need to be willing to deal with rejection and still soldier on. Since I’ve been submitting work again, I usually have up to 18 short stories out and about. Some of them are rejected quickly, sometimes within 24 hours, while others remain in editors slush piles for several months, only to be rejected. So far, I’ve only managed to place two stories. I won’t say where because, until they are published, there is still a chance I may be messed around. It’s happened before and could happen again. One editor promised to send me a contract in August. I’m still waiting. I have signed a contract for the other story, but I note d a clause stating I will need to make suitable marketing efforts via “my social media channels, including Twitter and Facebook”. I don’t use social media. Nor do I intend to, but if the story is published, I will add the publication credit to my website.
This is another thing that’s new to me—the growing expectancy that authors use social media. One way or another, finding suitable markets for stories only seems likely to get harder.