[Writingworkshop] submission attempt

[Adam Holland]

Hey everyone,

As you may know,  *Nature* opened up its "Futures" fiction feature to any
submission.

I sent them my "Sing-song of John-Q. Post-human"
.
Joe had actually suggested I do that when I wrote it a few years ago, but
submissions were by invitation only at the time.

It was rejected, sadly. (My guess is it wasn't "hard" enough, take a look at
their guidelines if you want details)
but my correspondence with the editor was very friendly and real, and
encouraging.  anyone have any ideas for pieces under 1000 words?

I include the relevant pieces of it below, mostly because I imagine that
anything surrounding submission for publication is the sort of thing people
are curious about.


Best,
Adam
--
When copies are free, you need to sell things which can not be copied.

Dear Mr. Gee,

Attached please find a submission for *Futures, * my story ""The Sing-Song
of John Q. Post-Human."

I wrote this while taking a course entitled "Writing SF" with author Joe
Haldeman.  He enjoyed it, and given its length, encouraged me to submit it
to you for publication.

 The story is a humorous bio-tech reimagining of Rudyard Kipling's "The
Singsong of Old Man Kangaroo <http://www.boop.org/jan/justso/kanga.htm>",
and I find that it has a narrative cadence that works best if it is read
aloud.  I hope that you enjoy it.

I also have an accompanying poem, in the same way that Kipling's original
did, but have left it out based on the length constraints on your website.
If you'd like to see it, please let me know.


Best,
Adam Holland



Dear Adam



Thanks very much for your interest in Futures, and for sending us your story
'The Sing-Song of John Q Posthuman'. Unfortunately it's not for us.



I have attached our guidelines, for your future reference.



Thanks for reading it, Henry.
I know you are busy, but may I ask if you personally enjoyed it, even if it
isn't right for Nature?

Best,



Dear Adam



Yes, I did, more for the quality of the writing than anything else. I think
this might work in a magazine that does SF and nothing else, as a kind of
light-relief item. For a magazine that has one SF item a week, we must steer
fairly close to a conventional story format. As this is very hard to achieve
in a vigntette - and vigntettes do lend themselves to non-narrative forms -
I do stretch a point, as you have seen.



Don't be discouraged. You write well.  More, please.
-- 
When copies are free, you need to sell things which can not be copied.
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