Substantially Revised Manuscripts

It's market dependent. For example,

- WOTF allow resubmissions. It used to be more common here, but its still within the rules. 

- Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Clarkesworld, specifically say - no resubmissions.

- Flash Fiction Online had a submission window recently where they specifically allowed resubmissions if you queried the editor first

- Some magazines will allow it if they change editors; some won't.

The way to resolve it is to check the individual market's submission guidelines, and then obviously respect whatever they say on the matter

Posted by: @gideonpsmith

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It's market dependent. For example,

- WOTF allow resubmissions. It used to be more common here, but its still within the rules. 

- Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Clarkesworld, specifically say - no resubmissions.

- Flash Fiction Online had a submission window recently where they specifically allowed resubmissions if you queried the editor first

- Some magazines will allow it if they change editors; some won't.

 

The way to resolve it is to check the individual market's submission guidelines, and then obviously respect whatever they say on the matter

That response makes sense, but there are a few nuances to consider. I won't speak for everyone—just for myself—as a rule, I revise my texts multiple times. Sometimes I spot a flaw in the manuscript right away, but other times my vision gets blurred, and after several preliminary edits, I think to myself, 'This is it, the final draft.' So I start sharing it around or submitting it to contests. When you finish a long project, your hands are itching to put it out there. But then time passes, and the text no longer seems quite so perfect, so I edit the manuscript again.

There can be a massive gap between the initial and final versions. What was first submitted looks weak in hindsight, while the almost completely rewritten draft feels like a masterpiece. But by then, there's nowhere left to show it. The piece is genuinely valuable, though, and tossing it into the trash feels like an absolute crime. I realize one should exercise more restraint from the start, but for a creative person, mastering those internal impulses is sometimes next to impossible. Besides, being a good writer is not the same as being a good salesperson.

On another note, I'd also like to discuss text readability levels here. Right now, I feel like the level of the vast majority of readers demands total simplification. Could you point me toward the right section of the forum to open a thread on this? I'm new here and still getting my bearings.

@dym So I think writers exist on a spectrum in terms of many aspects of their writing - some are plotters, some pantsers, most of us fall somewhere in-between. The same goes for our editing tendencies. Some of us edit insufficiently as we are so anxious to get it out and then tinker with it subsequently. Some have the opposite problem - they insist on so many 'just one more editing pass' or crit group feedback sessions that they never seem to send anything out. I think as far as editing goes that is usually a combination of experience and personality, but whereas for plotters vs pantsers there are advantages vs disadvantages of each approach and what you do probably doesn't matter for your overall success as long as it works for you, for editing the ideal probably lies somewhere in the middle. Sending things out to quick does lead to running out of markets. Taking too long means nothing goes out. And I relate as I have sent a story or two out which only later did I realize I could make much better.

The best solution is truly to get at least one persons eyes on it before you send. It's amazing how many times someone else can say 'whats their name? "whats their gender?" "Wait, this wasn't on Earth? "they were squids??" or some other detail that existed IN YOUR MIND and so you were blind to its absence on the page.

But it also suggests you might want to reconsider when you consider things 'ready' if this is a common problem for you at the moment - you put so much work into a piece to create it, it is a shame if you waste that out of eagerness to send it out. But at the end of the day its a choice, and you have to choose the outcome you find least painful.

As to where to discuss text readability - I would think this section would be right as its labelled 'craft'. 

Posted by: @gideonpsmith

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But at the end of the day its a choice, and you have to choose the outcome you find least painful.

I completely agree with what you wrote, but I have a few things to add. It's one thing when an author spots weaknesses in a text themselves and revises it according to their own vision. It's quite another when it comes to feedback—getting genuine, constructive input isn't easy for every author. In my case, while I did receive feedback, it was often tied to the readers' comprehension level. Very frequently, that level sat around a 2nd-to-5th-grade reading standard—no higher. So, I naturally ignored comments that urged me to simplify the text, as doing so would destroy a massive part of the manuscript's essence: its rhythm, authorial voice, and poetic tone.

And by the way, I've had my share of 'squid-type' questions too! However, I'd like to explore the topic of readability and how an author should handle feedback in a separate thread that I'll create soon. For now, I'd like to invite other authors to weigh in—how do the rest of you handle the dilemma outlined in this topic?

Posted by: @dym

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getting genuine, constructive input isn't easy for every author.

If it's any comfort, it isn't easy (in many senses) for any author.  I think what you are saying (?) is that you have not yet found a crit group that can read at the level of what you are writing. If that's the case, then I would encourage you to broaden your pool of critters - there is an exchange thread here in the forum where people exchange, then read and respond in private, on eachothers work. Try that out. There are many here who are well-attuned to at least what WOTF likes

If that solves the problem then I would count that as a success

If even there people are missing metaphors or... similies - that may help highlight actual problems on the page. None of us write perfectly clear, engaging text all the time so I do think there is value in finding the right second set of eyes.

So, I'm a reviser. What I do is send my story to one market at a time. If an editor gives me some feedback I agree with, or if I look at it and realize I can make it better, I'll revise it and then send it to the next market (with the exception of WOTF, never a previous one). If I run out of markets, or if I no longer believe in that story, I file it away and start again with a new story. Actually, you should start this new story as soon as you send the previous one out on its first submission. A new story helps get the other one out of your head, and will grow your writing skills. 

I don't think of my filed away stories as wasted effort. They allowed me to practice and grow. And I can always resurrect bits and pieces of them into new stories that can hit the markets again. 

Posted by: @reigheena

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So, I'm a reviser. What I do is send my story to one market at a time. If an editor gives me some feedback I agree with, or if I look at it and realize I can make it better, I'll revise it and then send it to the next market (with the exception of WOTF, never a previous one). If I run out of markets, or if I no longer believe in that story, I file it away and start again with a new story. Actually, you should start this new story as soon as you send the previous one out on its first submission. A new story helps get the other one out of your head, and will grow your writing skills. 

I don't think of my filed away stories as wasted effort. They allowed me to practice and grow. And I can always resurrect bits and pieces of them into new stories that can hit the markets again. 

Well, that's certainly one approach—and why not, if it works for you. But I took a very different path: after searching online, I sent my text out to every single available venue all at once. My logic was simple: a single market can easily reject you, but if you query 20 places at once, the odds of getting read and noticed are much higher. And honestly, that strategy might have actually worked if the version I originally submitted was anywhere near what it is now. Instead, I essentially backed myself into a corner and blocked my own paths.

As for starting a new story—that's solid advice in theory, but first, I'm not a particularly prolific author, and second, I already have several other stories sitting around that almost no one has seen yet. I'd rather deal with what I already have on my plate first.

Besides, I don't recall ever completely abandoning any story I've written to completion. I might overhaul it completely—and more than once, at that—but I never throw a project away, and I always push a text until it's fully polished. I don't remember ever writing a piece that was utter trash from the start. Sure, there were heavily flawed initial drafts, but never complete rubbish in my prose. So there's nothing to 'salvage' from scraps—the story as a whole is worth finishing.

Posted by: @gideonpsmith

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the right second set of eyes.

Regarding finding the right pair of eyes—the advice is good, of course, but there are a few major caveats:

1. Even if you do find one or a few pairs of eyes, that is far from a guarantee that they will be the right ones. It doesn't mean the critique will be adequately strict, or genuinely truthful rather than sugarcoated—most people here swap critiques hoping to get a nice response in return, which kills objectivity. Unfiltered, public criticism generally works much better.

2. There's also the issue that a good writer isn't always a good critic. Personally, I'm a terrible critic, so pairing up with someone would mean shortchanging the other person.

There was something else I wanted to add, but it slipped my mind.

Posted by: @dym

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Well, that's certainly one approach—and why not, if it works for you. But I took a very different path: after searching online, I sent my text out to every single available venue all at once.

 

Well, that's another approach. Many markets don't allow simsubs though so hopefully you respect that - and I say that as you have encountered the first problem with your approach which is that everyone saw an early draft and everyone rejected it. The other problem would be what if two simsub markets had accepted? You'd then be in the uncomfortable position of explaining to one how you simsubbed it despite their rules and while not all, some markets may not consider further submissions from you. You could face some awkwardness withdrawing from non-simsub markets if theres not an anonymous mechanism like moksha to do so. Again - choices - but my advice would be don't kill your long term relationship with significant markets by deliberately ignoring rules they have posted

Posted by: @dym

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My logic was simple: a single market can easily reject you, but if you query 20 places at once, the odds of getting read and noticed are much higher.

Well, the odds don't change between simultaneous and sequential, only the total length of time - thats why as @reigheena said most of us that submit outside WOTF are constantly working on 'the next project' as the more parallel projects you have available the more efficient the submission time can be (if you have only piece A, your total time is T to work through all markets so 1 piece in T time. If you have A and B, they can each be at different markets and its 2 pieces in time T - os more efficient, without breaking simsub rules)

Posted by: @dym

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I don't remember ever writing a piece that was utter trash from the start.

Sounds like I should be taking your advice, rather than offering it There are many pieces I have noodled with but found them wanting and unworthy for sending out.

Posted by: @dym

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Personally, I'm a terrible critic, so pairing up with someone would mean shortchanging the other person.

 

This is true - not all writers are good critics of either their own or other people's work. But at least for other people you have one major asset they do not have - you do not know what is in their brain. So you only know whats on the page. And so just reading it, as a reader, and simply saying " I didn't pick up on this" "I didn't understand this" "this section didn't hold my interest" is often the most useful advice you can give. Also, critiquing is a skill, and one that can be developed - partly by practice and also receiving crit and seeing what kind of things other people say and which kinds of comments are useful. You don't have to do it, but your trajectory (craft skills and publication record) as a writer will likely benefit if you do.

Posted by: @gideonpsmith

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Again - choices - but my advice would be don't kill your long term relationship with significant markets by deliberately ignoring rules they have posted

As for breaking rules—I have no intention of breaking anything. I'm not crying over endless grief or complaining about how unfair the world is; I'm simply looking for a way forward and trying to figure out if one actually exists."

Honestly, I find it quite strange that no one seems concerned about what to do with heavily reworked old manuscripts. I just don't believe that people never rewrite their older stuff. So where do they actually put it? What do they do with it?

I love rewriting stuff. I'm not an idea machine, but more of a sentence-level perfectionist. Plus, I tend to think about what I've written and find ways to enhance it, then dive in. Sometimes this means things are never complete and they sit on my hard drive, or I don't submit them and they sit on my hard drive, but I'm personally OK with that. The alternative is rejections (do as I say, not as I do, and submit). 

I'm hoping to get my first book out this year (self-pub) which is a heavily revised (literally changed from a movie script to a novel) version of a two-decade old idea/story. I just have to do the publication work and get it done - soon. 

So, sometimes things get out there, and sometimes they rot in the trunk.

Posted by: @tj_knight

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So, sometimes things get out there, and sometimes they rot in the trunk.

I love rewriting too. In fact, I feel like I enjoy rewriting even more than drafting the initial text. But there's a catch. Sooner or later, my stories do reach a state of completion. And it's one thing when something derivative, unpolished, and flawed sits decaying in your drawer. But it's an entirely different story when there is nothing left to refine, and your finished, polished work sits there rotting, wanted by no one—even though it genuinely deserves to be read.

Posted by: @dym

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Posted by: @tj_knight

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So, sometimes things get out there, and sometimes they rot in the trunk.

I love rewriting too. In fact, I feel like I enjoy rewriting even more than drafting the initial text. But there's a catch. Sooner or later, my stories do reach a state of completion. And it's one thing when something derivative, unpolished, and flawed sits decaying in your drawer. But it's an entirely different story when there is nothing left to refine, and your finished, polished work sits there rotting, wanted by no one—even though it genuinely deserves to be read.

The issue for me is finding the someone (agent, editor) who wants to pay money for it. First I have to find the 99 that don't. I don't take the rejections well and they halt my momentum, so for me, I'd rather have a good morning and write 800 new words than get the familiar "Thank you for submitting but..." email then close my computer and watch something on Netflix. 

This is not the way to become a bestseller. I know this, and yet I choose this path. It is flawed.  

Posted by: @tj_knight

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The issue for me is finding the someone (agent, editor) who wants to pay money for it. First I have to find the 99 that don't. I don't take the rejections well and they halt my momentum, so for me, I'd rather have a good morning and write 800 new words than get the familiar "Thank you for submitting but..." email then close my computer and watch something on Netflix. 

This is not the way to become a bestseller. I know this, and yet I choose this path. It is flawed.

The fact that penniless no-names struggle to break through doesn't surprise me. What did surprise me, though, is that professional authors with decades in the industry face the exact same battle to get published. I used to think that once you've been in the literary community for that long, things would be much easier—that you'd have established contacts among publishers and magazine editors.

Or take literary agencies and individual agents: why don't you work with an agent? Looking online, I see plenty of agencies with senior and associate agents. Even if they pass on unknown authors, why aren't you working with them? Is representation a dead end for most people, or am I mistaken about your background and you're not a full-time professional writer? In any case, if it's permitted here, I'd be interested to hear your perspective on literary agencies

One (I) must "win" an agent with a query letter, sometimes a sample, then a full manuscript. They (as an individual representing their company) have to want to champion that novel (and possibly/probably the author), then make the offer to represent that person, committing to hours and hours of trying to sell that story/book to a publisher. 

So I must send my query letter to potentially dozens of agents in the hopes that I can work through the process of hooking one with my bait (Okay, not my best analogy). 

I don't really mind that process, but there are times I close my browser in a fury because one agency will ask how many followers I have (for example) across social media. One even wanted me to list the numbers individually across eight different social websites. Uh, no. 

I'm not a full-time writer. I own my own business, so I don't even work the traditional 8 hour days. I usually work more, and occasionally weekends. Plus, I'm a husband and dad, and since I work from home, I'm also the homemaker (you should see my sink, right now, it is full of dishes I'm trying to ignore). I have an hour or two of writing each day if I get up at 4am because at 6am I start the process of getting my son ready for school, driving him in, then coming home and going straight to work. 

Anyway, that's probably TMI. 😉 

I could spend some of those hours sending out my query letter, and I reallllly should. It's a mental block, or an emotional block. I just want to write my 700 words and live in my head and have my characters do cool stuff. Poor professional choice. Great personal one. 

Posted by: @tj_knight

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One (I) must "win" an agent with a query letter, sometimes a sample, then a full manuscript. They (as an individual representing their company) have to want to champion that novel (and possibly/probably the author), then make the offer to represent that person, committing to hours and hours of trying to sell that story/book to a publisher. 

So I must send my query letter to potentially dozens of agents in the hopes that I can work through the process of hooking one with my bait (Okay, not my best analogy). 

 

Well, well... I was actually thinking about reaching out to a few junior literary agents. But if even someone who has been in the established literary community for a long time gets these kinds of demands, then what chances does a no-name author have? By the way, I was revising my story trying to simplify it, and I got tangled up again. If you don't mind, could you evaluate these 5 paragraphs? Did it get better, stay the same, or actually get worse?

There is scarcely a heart anywhere in the wide world into which Helplessness, like some strange, loathsome jellyfish, has never slipped. Most often this trouble strikes in the dead of night, when all things—the great and the small, the true and the false, the real and the half-real—lose their primordial essence, leveling the Scales of Foremost Importance. At such hours even the most cherished amulets, for a time, lose their protective power, leaving all at the mercy of Blind Fate.

Blind Fate, and none other. For Helplessness is far from always guided by purity of heart or by rank when she makes her dark choice—no, not at all! Quite often, for reasons no one can fathom, she is heedless and hurries off elsewhere, and having barely touched a soul with her poisonous feelers, she leaves it at once. And nothing much changes. For such lucky ones, it all passes like a restless delirium. But sometimes… Sometimes those gelatinous tentacles find the narrowest cracks in a heart, and those into whose very being this loathsomeness has seeped stop seeking the truth, stop rejoicing, and forget all good. From then on, only despair, malice, and indifference guide their deeds. And it seems that neither the sunniest day, nor sincere love, nor a friend’s sympathy—indeed, nothing at all—can help them.

Yet it is not quite so. However invulnerable Helplessness may seem, in truth even she is often powerless before the True Word. That primeval force that can cleanse every soul of its evil poison, save perhaps the very blackest. That sincere voice, ringing even in the gloom of hard times. That is why, lest Truth perish, and so that there might be something to stand against Falsehood, this lay has been passed from mouth to mouth to this very day. And, as the behests of olden times decree, it begins thus…

Once, at the edge of the world, there ruled a mighty lord, famed far and wide—the North Wind. Mighty indeed, for in those days none could match his strength. Renowned indeed, for his glory rang through the world and, without exaggeration, knew no bounds. So it came to pass that he ruled not the north alone. Sometimes, sweeping over the south in his snow-white sleigh, he would blight everything in his path with his icy breath. And oh, what troubles those visits brought upon the warm lands. And oh, how hard it was at times for the South Wind, younger though he was, and almost as mighty a lord, to reclaim his domain.

And who knows how it might all have ended, had the North Wind not hurried home every time. He did not hurry out of any love of haste, nor was it always longing that drove him—yet who in his place would dally, with the Guardian of the Snowy Millstones for a wife? For the master of the north knew well that his snowy mistress could receive him in very different ways after a long parting. She might greet him as though nothing had happened, or she might remember everything under the sun. But let us not speak of that now.

I still have no issue with this. It reads well enough to me (sorry I don't remember the previous, but this one flowed, so possibly improved).

It's not the type of writing I generally read, but that doesn't mean I don't recognize what I'd call the good stuff. This reminds me of Salman Rushdie. Take away the controversy and holy cow can that dude write! He's NYT, so there's a market for it. Like any style or subject, it just takes time to find a match. I do hope you find one. 

Posted by: @tj_knight

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I still have no issue with this. It reads well enough to me (sorry I don't remember the previous, but this one flowed, so possibly improved).

It's not the type of writing I generally read, but that doesn't mean I don't recognize what I'd call the good stuff. This reminds me of Salman Rushdie. Take away the controversy and holy cow can that dude write! He's NYT, so there's a market for it. Like any style or subject, it just takes time to find a match. I do hope you find one. 

My apologies—I posted this exact excerpt in a slightly different revision in my other, neighboring thread, but I was being careless and didn't realize this was a different thread.

2. The reason I asked for a comparison is that, to me, the previous revision felt simple and clear, yet more than a few people I showed the excerpts to pointed out the text's complexity. So I'm trying to simplify it somewhat without losing my authorial style or balance. When I do this, it feels like I'm hitting a compromise. But re-reading the result, I'm plagued by serious doubts—and these doubts are of a different nature than those during standard revision. When I edit normally, I feel what I dislike and I know what I want to achieve. Here, however, I liked everything as it was, but I'm trying to adapt slightly for others without losing the core. And because of that, I'm completely unsure if I've turned in the right direction.

3. Thank you for the evaluation and feedback. As for the specific genre/type of this story of mine—I don't usually read this type of fiction much myself, yet I wrote it anyway. Then again, every single story I write is entirely unlike the last. I hate writing in the exact same vein or repeating myself. That's why I have an epic fairy tale, an action-packed saga, a mystical thriller, an interplanetary narrative, and various system-matrix speculative stories.

4. As for whether I'll find someone... even I'm not so sure about that. I don't seem to have much of a knack for compromising simplification. And I certainly won't cut my work to the bone."