I’m writing up a storm. And editing. And submitting. Without submissions, there is no publishing.
In the last month I’ve been submitting my work. With editors right now are two novellas, two picture books, and eight short stories. If they get rejected, I’m going to submit them somewhere else as quickly as I can.
I’m not done yet. I’m doing final edits on a number of other short stories and I’m excited to get them out into the wild, as they say.
What Do I Want?
For one of the picture books — a series. One id a standalone, but the other is adaptable (I have two others in the series in motion). I want excellent illustrations.
For the two novellas — movie deals. Seriously. They need to be novellas first. They need to be read by people who love to read.
For the short stories — a hungry audience. A couple could be converted into books with pictures. Most are literary. Lots of layers, symbols, good ideas. A few get into difficult questions, though a few are lighter. One is a modern fable.
What’s Already Published?
Over 30 stories are out there. Two collections. Modern tall tales and Gothic tragedy. A bunch of devotional material with a couple of publishers, parts of larger collections marketed for runners and for lovers of classic literature. A bunch of poetry — for many years, a magazine commissioned me about twice a year to write a poem.
What’s Next?
Waiting. Lots of weighting. The earliest I’m expecting a response is early July. It could go as late as this fall.
More submissions. A lot more submissions. I’m not writing so quickly so much as I am editing existing work. I hope to submit another 10 pieces by the end of June.
So much depends on my day job writing speeches. The summer tends to be a quieter time, but this is an industry that doesn’t really care what I think it’s tendencies are. A client might call with a big project or several projects with a tight deadline leaving me to completely focus on getting it done. For example for one particular client, I had to write 30 speeches in the span of three weeks. That meant 16+ hour days and more coffee than Juan Valdez has ever seen.
What Could Happen
“Is this Mr. Anthony Trendl? Yes? Great. Listen, one of our interns, the one who reads the slush pile, grabbed your story from the app and downloaded it. Anyway, they just glanced at it before filing it for later review—that’s our normal procedure. They read the first two paragraphs and couldn’t stop. Now, normally it goes through two or three more people, but this intern came straight to my office and told me I had to read your piece, ‘—–.’ I did, and wow. Now, this is unusual, and in any other situation, we would jump on this, but, well, I gave a call to my old college roommate who now works at Random House.”
“Random House?”
“Right, right. I told him the gist of the story, and he asked me to send it to him. I did, and while we were both on the phone, we read it together, each taking a character or two. I hope… I hope you don’t mind. So here’s the thing: our magazine is too small for you. I mean, we’re flattered. Don’t get me wrong.”
“You’re rejecting my story?” I said, arriving at my usual disappointed place.
“Yes, no, sort of. My friend at Random House, he wants to talk with you.”
“Um,” I’d say, “Yeah. Wow. When’s he going to call?”
“No. You don’t understand. He wants to meet you in California.”
Replying once again, still confused, I’d say, “I don’t get it. They’re in New York.”
“They are, but Jim Morris is in Emeryville,” [the magazine’s] editor will explain.
“Who? Where?”
“CEO of Pixar. Near San Francisco.”
At this point, I’m pacing the room nervously, trying to be cool.
“Uh,” I would say that out loud but also quietly to myself. I don’t exactly have the funds to talk with anybody about a story. Not in California. I don’t expect to make more than a few hundred dollars if everything goes well.
“Let me explain. California. My buddy at Random House thinks this would be a great opportunity for Pixar to work with them. My buddy makes this into a book, he knows a great artist, and Pixar, well, they’ve been looking for some standalone scripts.”
“Yeah, but I… ” I began, but he didn’t let me finish.
“As I mentioned, my buddy’s going to call you. You’re not obligated to anything, but they’re going to fly you out and put you up in a great hotel. They don’t want to get into a whole bidding war. They want to make this happen. They also want to hear about your other submissions.”
“They’re going to… ” I stumbled once again.
“Probably the Fairmont San Francisco. Really nice.”
“I… Now, see… ” I stumbled through words looking not nearly as intelligent as I pretend to be.
“Look, I know you weren’t expecting this. Your story’s got the gravitas of Bambi, the sweetness of Peter Rabbit, with the depth of The Lion King—the original, not the weird new one.”
I’d sit there, just as I’ve been sitting for the last nine years in my basement, trying to compose myself, trying to figure out if I had some bad pizza because the hallucinations were going someplace surreal.
“His people will call you tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I’m going to put you in touch with Jo’s agent.”
“Joe?”
“Jo. Joanne. Joanne Rowling. J.K. Rowling.”
Somewhere around this point, I would be in a pile of weird emotions and probably starting to count my chickens before they hatch… only to learn later the chickens weren’t involved, but a golden goose. Then, I could get the fence fixed, maybe the windows replaced.
That’s what I wish would happen. Hence, all of the submissions.
Why a Snail?
The snail, a little friend I found working its way across my porch, is on a mission even though it might take a while. All of my submissions will receive a response but likewise, it might take a while.