I’ve noticed that in my short fiction, I usually write from the POV of a male character. In fact, of the stories which I’ve sold, 12 of them have had male POV characters, 3 of them female  POV characters,  and 1 had a POV which shifted between a male and female character. That’s pretty overwhelming, but really, I’m just choosing what seems best for each individual story. Any other authors out there who tend to select (overwhelmingly) POV characters of the opposite gender?

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And on a sad and glum note, a story of mine (one of my favorites!) earned its fourth rejection tonight. Here are the comments received with each rejection so far. I’m paraphrasing:

Fantasy Magazine said: No on this, but do send another.

Strange Horizons passed on it, without comment.

Abyss & Apex said: No. Good story, but begins slowly. Try fixing that.

Beneath Ceaseless Skies said: Good beginning, but the story didn’t live up to its promise.

Hah! Try reconciling those last two! Actually, I do like this story as is, and in the midst of other projects I don’t feel like going back and reworking the same stories over and over.  Also, I do feel pretty confident that it will be published somewhere, eventually. So I’m sending it off again tomorrow, and going back to the other things that interest me right now.

..but I finished the short story on Thursday, the one I was trying to get done for last Monday. It’s a fantasy, with a first-person female narrator, and I have to say, it surprised me along the way with its developments, and I like the way it turned out. 

The delay was due partly to the excuses I kept making to procrastinate, and partly to the fact that I was underestimating the final word-count of story. I thought it might have 4000-4500 words, but it actually took 6000 to tell the story right. In fact, there were 6100-and-something at the end, and I went through the story and eliminated over 100 words - mainly because the market I had in mind has an upper limit of 6000 words, but truthfully, the story did benefit from being trimmed a little.

Oh, and this one was carefully proof-read. And submitted to a fairly good market, so the odds against it being accepted are long.

… has a fool for an author. Isn’t that what they say?

On account of this I’m writing a second post today.

New story, written, finished, submitted. That’s SUB-MIT-TED, past tense. Gone, via e-mail to an editor. I swear, last night it looked perfect. Now, looking at it again I see three typos.

Instead of anyway, I have any way. Okay, that one’s no biggie.

Instead of disassemble, I have dissemble. And THAT is a totally different word.

Instead of he reviewed these in his mind, I have he reviewed in his mind these.  That one comes from fooling around with the sentence a bit too much, but it sounds bad. Really bad.

That’s three in a story of barely over 4000 words. If I find another, I may have to poke out my eyes!

Is it enough for an editor to reject a story, do you think?