It may be that I didn’t pay attention in school—but my grades seemed to indicate otherwise—but I don’t recall learning about genre. Of course I recognized science fiction and horror and western and romance. What about those that fit no category? This used to be called “literary fiction” but those who publish literary fiction don’t like elements of “genre fiction” and won’t generally consider them. Thus I fear to submit. My story collection, Empty Branches , submitted to Tartarus Books, received the quick Band-Aid treatment. Three days from submission to rejection. They prefer, I suppose, straight horror. I write something that defies genre. It is the kind of thing that lurks in my mind. This followed on the heels of a slow, six-month rejection for a single story that is very much in the Lovecraftian mode. In times such as this, I remind myself that Lovecraft had great difficulty getting published. Today Poe would have a hard t...
Blog of a struggling writer.