Rejectomancy

WordCount

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It can be terrible.

Do you use straight quotes or curly quotes?

If you use curly quotes, OO adds one word for every pair.
ie. "I went to the shop." would be 6 words.

It's better with the straight quotes, but is still glitchy on other things like dashes (apparently, I'm not a big dash user).

Which is sad, because I really like OO. (Plus, I really don't feel like paying for MS Office. :D)

I use straight quotes, which minimize that. But in regard of the em dashes, oh God. No wonder Clarkesworld said it was too short, because I had nearly twenty em dashes!

*Shakes head.

Thanks for the info, though, Lillie.
 

Lillie

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I also found that OO buggered up rtf files. I never could find a way round that.

That was why I changed.

Someone gave me a copy of word 2003. I use that now.

You could try abi word. It's free, small and it does all sorts of formats, including otd.
I don't know what the word count is like on it, you'd have to check it out.
 

alimay

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Same here on Open Office buggering up RTF files. That's why I stopped using it, because converting to RTF is pretty basic stuff which just about ANY word processor should be able to do.

I mainly use Word Starter now, which works great once you get used to the ad on the side.

Ali
 

JWGriebel

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I've been waiting to here from Buzzy for about a month, and I've been tied up in the second round at ASIM for a couple weeks.

Am I the only person who constantly thinks about a story once I submit it?
 

defcon6000

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I use RoughDraft, myself. Free to download. I have a free version of M$, but it's limited features and an annoying blinking advertisement in the corner. But I find the word differences between RD and M$ to be minimal, only a few words.
 

O'Dandelo

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I've been waiting to here from Buzzy for about a month, and I've been tied up in the second round at ASIM for a couple weeks.

Am I the only person who constantly thinks about a story once I submit it?

I also obsess over stories once an initial few days have gone by. Especially when I see rejections start to be reported on Duotrope.

And Buzzy just sent out a batch of a dozen or so rejections in the last two days, so congrats! You made it through. I'm only at 22 days there myself, but I'm choosing to believe I also made it through that cut.
 

kd1984

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I also obsess over stories once an initial few days have gone by. Especially when I see rejections start to be reported on Duotrope.

And Buzzy just sent out a batch of a dozen or so rejections in the last two days, so congrats! You made it through. I'm only at 22 days there myself, but I'm choosing to believe I also made it through that cut.


You're not alone. I obsess, too. My obsession today is with Apex. Especially after reading the story of the rejected acceptance, I've become especially nervous. My submission to them is sitting at a measley 11 days, but they have a smattering of duotrope responses of 1, 2, 3, and 4 day rejections. Has me thinking that my submission wasn't received.

I have something out to Buzzy, too, but I'm only at 16 days with that one.
 

alexshvartsman

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I've been waiting to here from Buzzy for about a month, and I've been tied up in the second round at ASIM for a couple weeks.

Am I the only person who constantly thinks about a story once I submit it?

I freely admit to checking Duotrope once a day. And by checking I mean looking at the recent responses page for EVERY MARKET where I have an active submission. With just under 20 submissions recorded this takes about a minute total, but it's still probably unhealthy.

I'm at 17 days at Buzzy. Saw a bunch of month-old rejections on DT but also several 12-day ones. I'm not sure what the difference is, and if there are multiple rounds of reading, but I'll choose to see this as a positive sign.

Currently in round 2 at Drabblecast, Penumbra and DSF, and in round 3 at ASIM. So plenty to obsess about :)
 

JWGriebel

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I also obsess over stories once an initial few days have gone by. Especially when I see rejections start to be reported on Duotrope.

And Buzzy just sent out a batch of a dozen or so rejections in the last two days, so congrats! You made it through. I'm only at 22 days there myself, but I'm choosing to believe I also made it through that cut.

I hope we did. We should keep our fingers crossed and obsessively check our inboxes for the next two days just in case :ROFL:


I freely admit to checking Duotrope once a day. And by checking I mean looking at the recent responses page for EVERY MARKET where I have an active submission. With just under 20 submissions recorded this takes about a minute total, but it's still probably unhealthy.

I'm at 17 days at Buzzy. Saw a bunch of month-old rejections on DT but also several 12-day ones. I'm not sure what the difference is, and if there are multiple rounds of reading, but I'll choose to see this as a positive sign.

Currently in round 2 at Drabblecast, Penumbra and DSF, and in round 3 at ASIM. So plenty to obsess about :)

I'm in round two at Penumbra as well. I forgot to mention them.


And I'm not versed in using Duotrope, so I sort of suffer and just think, and think--and think.
 

O'Dandelo

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I'm at 17 days at Buzzy. Saw a bunch of month-old rejections on DT but also several 12-day ones. I'm not sure what the difference is, and if there are multiple rounds of reading, but I'll choose to see this as a positive sign.

In situations like this, my inner obsessor looks at the number of pending submissions and the median number. If I can say "Oh, there are still tons of stories pending around the same age as mine," then common sense kicks in and I downgrade back to normal cricket mode.
 

d.thomaswise

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Statistics are a dangerous thing to pin hope on, particularly when it comes to editors and slush readers. I hear they are immune to statistical analysis; some kind of genetic aberration or something.

Of course, that doesn't stop me from reading the duotrope tea leaves whenever I find myself avoiding tackling a difficult scene.
 

sarahthegrey

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On the topic of duotrope obsessions...26-day R from Beneath Ceaseless Skies. It's a short piece and it had survived several waves of 9 or 10-day rejections, so I got my hopes up a little.

I think day-counting is the most dangerous breed of rejectomancy.

At least it was personal. I love that about BCS.
 

Lillie

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I freely admit to checking Duotrope once a day. And by checking I mean looking at the recent responses page for EVERY MARKET where I have an active submission. With just under 20 submissions recorded this takes about a minute total, but it's still probably unhealthy.

I just click for the RSS feed and look at them all together.
 

Lillie

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Yeah, but I keep it on an open tab.

Do you want to know how many times a day I refresh that page?

I'm just very efficient in my procrastination.
 

alexshvartsman

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Yeah, but I keep it on an open tab.

Do you want to know how many times a day I refresh that page?

I'm just very efficient in my procrastination.

Whatever you do, DO NOT teach me how to do that. And I will strive not to learn on my own.

If I figured out the RSS thingie I would be refreshing that 20-30 times a day, and that just wouldn't be healthy.

As is, I probably spend more time on boards like this one, Twitter, Facebook and just TALKING about writing than I do actually writing.
 

WordCount

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Whatever you do, DO NOT teach me how to do that. And I will strive not to learn on my own.

If I figured out the RSS thingie I would be refreshing that 20-30 times a day, and that just wouldn't be healthy.

As is, I probably spend more time on boards like this one, Twitter, Facebook and just TALKING about writing than I do actually writing.

I think that's the downfall of all writers. We talk the talk all day long, but we rarely walk the walk.
 

Lillie

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I don't know. Alex seems to be walking the walk!

I'm just sitting on the settee, thinking about food.
 

Sai

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Well, there's my 278-day R from Analog. :(

Geez, Analog has really been drawing their Rs out lately. Sorry about the rejection.

Received a rejection from Apex, though part of me is just relieved that it wasn't auto-rejected for being so close to their max limit (my story is 4,900, they don't accept anything over 5,000).
 

fihr

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Ouch. A 278 day rejection would hurt. And sorry to hear about yours Sai, too, esp after I just enjoyed reading your other story in DSF.

I have had a story waiting at Bards and Sages for about 140 days now. I've heard nothing (no acknowledgement), and I think it might have just disappeared into the ether. Shame I can't tell if the email has just got lost or not. I've queried, but also not heard back yet. Don't know whether to 'withdraw' it (in case it did get through) so I can send it elsewhere, or just keep on waiting.