Photo by ‘Short stories are the loose change in the treasury of fiction’[1]
J. G. Ballard
You’ve just finished writing your short story, what next?
Do you send it out to endless magazines and competitions, or do you get brave and try and get your first anthology published first? What do you do? After all your favourite authors like Stephen King, Margaret Atwood and Angela Carter all have collections of their own. Shouldn’t yours be up there right next to theirs? For me, I can see myself submitting ‘The Bone Flowers’ to a niche magazine such as Shoreline of Infinity or perhaps Uncanny, both specialise in science fiction and fantasy, with a touch of horror. But be aware, some publications may ask you to edit it to make it suitable to publish. In fact, I had to make several changes to ‘The Bone Flowers’ just so it would make this blog including removing several characters to concentrate on Dave and Daisy’s narrative, taking out a violent sub plot, and adding more realistic emotions; all of which were legitimate changes that improved the storytelling. Author Tobias Wolff is known for constantly revising his short stories as he says ‘These are not holy texts. This isn’t the Dead Sea Scrolls. This is work that as long as it’s available to me to make better, I will.’[2]
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