Publish your work: Who Me?
An embarrassing admission to start this post; I never considered publishing my creative work. It didn’t occur to me I would want to publish. I didn’t aspire to be a novelist; I wasn’t sure that I was a poet. My writing comprises flash fiction, short stories, and experimental hybrid essays. As I progressed with my MA in Creative Writing, I challenged myself to think of how I could publish and submit my work. This blog post is an exploration of how I found places where my hybrid lyric essay, Learning to Live with the Dead, could sit, the publishers who consider hybrid and finally how I thought about submissions.
Hybrid writing
One challenge of publishing hybrid writing is a lack of understanding of what it is. You can think of hybrid writing as a piece of writing that contains multiple styles and genres in one piece. You can also view it as a form of creative non-fiction[1]. Sejal Shah’s[2] comment regarding hybrid writing captures the challenge ‘…albeit we are formless, to be published you must choose a form…pg59. She goes further in that she suggests that the publishing world limits writers by insisting they fit in a genre box.
I recently attended an industry day with agents and publishers. I asked an agent her view on hybrid works and if they were publishable. Her response was a categorical no. She said that hybrid work didn’t sell, and writers had to decide to write fiction or non-fiction. It seems Shah’s comment was very apt.
Despite this, there are hybrid works out there. Tania Hershman is a prolific writer in short form fiction and hybrid novels. Her PhD[3] is an imaginatively formatted hybrid novel using text, images, graphic poems, and diagrams. A small independent, Guillemot Press, originally published it, till it went out of print. Various small and independent presses and magazines publish her subsequent work, including flash fiction and short stories.
As I explored her work, I discovered a whole new set of authors who were writing in a form of hybrid. Lyric essays caught my attention and influenced my story, Learning to Live with the Dead. Established publishing houses such as Penguin published books like Bluets[4] and Citizen[5], which are both lyric essays by well-known writers.
Where do I fit?
Further conversations during the industry day revealed that the major publishing houses may not have a keen interest in publishing hybrid work of unknown authors, however the small presses are more open to experimental writing. Learning to Live with the Dead could be seen as experimental as it includes quotes, images, some theory and letter writing. Mslexia[6] offers a great guide to small presses, and I found this particularly useful for looking at my publication options.
As an unknown and novice writer, it was highly unlikely that I would attract a main press for niche writing. Magazines and online platforms appear to be a better solution. StreetCake, an online magazine, is specifically geared toward accepting experiential and hybrid writing. Other potential outlets for my lyric essay could include Hinterland or Phoebe. Further opportunities would be to set up my social media platform or a blog to share my work. I would choose Substack as my preferred option for blogging because I am familiar with it, and it provides a platform for both established and new writers. It seems hybrid writing is acceptable for publication; it is a matter of searching for the right opportunity and thinking about how you get yourself known as a writer.
How to begin
Despite finding a range of options that are geared to the hybrid form, I felt it was too big a leap to consider Learning to Live with the Dead for publication. I considered alternatives to traditional publishing, such as Spoken Word events. Before the end of the academic year, I made a promise to myself to read at Scrivener[7] and submit a piece of work to a magazine or competition.
I submitted a piece of work where the content was thematically like the lyric essay. It was a piece of flash fiction, which was about healthcare, a key theme in my work. I submitted this to an online magazine called Fish. When I pressed the ‘send’ button on my computer, I felt a frisson of excitement. The excitement didn’t last long as the magazine rejected the work. Learning to submit needs to have a disclaimer because it is also about learning to be rejected.
Rejections
A quick note on rejection; it’s going to happen! Liao[8] suggests the more you submit, the more likely you are to have something accepted. She spent a year aiming for 100 rejections. I took a deep breath at this; was I resilient enough to keep the rejections coming? My answer was uncertain, however, I decided that if I wanted to be a writer who published; I had to find a way of managing rejections[9]. I needed to change my mindset. There are plenty of books[10] and established authors who can tell you about managing rejections, but basically the change needs to come from within.
I’m trying to change my attitude to this and seeing rejection as not personal[11]. It just means that I didn’t fit the profile for that issue, and it doesn’t mean my writing is bad. Realistically, there are more rejections than acceptance letters. I try to remember this when the letters drop into my email box.
So, what has happened?
Well, it hasn’t been plain sailing. I submitted various pieces of work and received more rejections. It wasn’t all bad news. My submission got accepted for the University of Brighton Anthology of Flash Fiction, and the UK Film Festival script competition included me in their longlist. I read an extract of Learning to Live with the Deadat a spoken work event and some flash fiction at Scrivener. The full hybrid lyric essay is still not ready for the publishing world; however, it may one day raise its head. A curious outcome is that exploring publishing has helped me think about my writing in more detail. I have discovered themes across the range of forms I use, and this has enabled me to submit smaller pieces before I aim to submit something more detailed. I have learned that I want to be published, there are a whole range of options available to me and there is only one way to do it; keep submitting.
[1] Sean Prentiss, and Jessica Hendry Nelson, Advanced Creative Nonfiction: A Writer’s Guide and Anthology (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021).
[2] Sejal Shah in Margot Singer, and Nicole Walker, Bending Genre: Essays on Creative Nonfiction (Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2022).
[3] T Hershman, ‘Particle Fictions: An Experimental Approach to Creative Writing and Reading Informed by Particle Physics.’ (Bath Spa, 2016).
[4] Maggie Nelson, Bluets (London: Jonathan Cape, 2017).
[5 ]Claudia Rankine, Citizen: An American Lyric (Graywolf Press, 2014).
[6]Debbie Taylor, Indie Press Guide: The Mslexia Guide to Small and Independent Presses and Literary Magazines in the Uk and the Republic of Ireland. Third edition edn (Newcastle upon Tyne: Mslexia Publications, 2020).
[7] Scrivener is the University of Brighton Creative Writing Open Mic and reading evening.
[8] K. Liao, ‘Why You Should Aim for 100 Rejections a Year’, in Lit Hub (https://lithub.com/why-you-should-aim-for-100-rejections-a-year/: 2016).
[9] Evans Bec, and Chris Smith, Written (Faber & Faber, Limited, 2023).
[10] O’Reilly Sally, and Weldon Fay, How to Be a Writer (Little, Brown Book Group Limited, 2013). Ibid.
[11] ibid
Bibliography
Evans, B., and C. Smith. 2023. Written (Faber & Faber, Limited).
Hershman, T. 2016. ‘Particle fictions: an experimental approach to creative writing and reading informed by particle physics.’, Bath Spa.
Liao, K. 2016. “Why You Should Aim for 100 Rejections a Year.” In Lit Hub. https://lithub.com/why-you-should-aim-for-100-rejections-a-year/.
Nelson, Maggie. 2017. Bluets (Jonathan Cape: London).
O’Reilly, S., and F. Weldon. 2013. How to Be a Writer (Little, Brown Book Group Limited).
Prentiss, Sean, and Jessica Hendry Nelson. 2021. Advanced Creative Nonfiction: A Writer’s Guide and Anthology (Bloomsbury Publishing).
Rankine, Claudia. 2014. Citizen: an American lyric (Graywolf Press).
Singer, Margot, and Nicole Walker. 2022. Bending genre: Essays on creative nonfiction (Bloomsbury Publishing USA).
Taylor, Debbie. 2020. Indie press guide: the Mslexia guide to small and independent presses and literary magazines in the UK and the Republic of Ireland (Mslexia Publications: Newcastle upon Tyne).
Writers’ & artists’ yearbook 2023: the essential guide to the media and publishing industries : the perfect companion for writers of fiction and non-fiction, poets, playwrights, journalists and commercial artists. 2022. (Bloomsbury: London).