Tagline: Jenna worried she might be lonely when she moved from the city to a small town. Then she met Matt...
In a Nutshell: Online dog treat entrepreneur Jenna isn't sure she's going to like living in a small town. She hits it off with the postmaster when she's mailing her parents' anniversary gift and realizes she does like it after all.Observations: This story had several things going for it, Woman's World-wise.
1. It tried to show how nice small towns are. Sometimes I think Woman's World readers exist in a vacuum of perpetual Americana, or maybe that Johnene thinks they do. Either way, the goodwill of small town America always seems to be welcome within the pages of Woman's World.
2. There are dogs in the story. 'Nuff said.
3. Thurber included a Sentimental Item - Jenna's grandmother's wedding ring.
4. She also created an hero
ic hero. In WW, heroic behavior can take the form of gallantry and here, Matt offers to pay for the postage when Jenna realizes she left her wallet.
My Favorite Part: "I'm the postmaster...and you're new in town.
"Still unpacking," Jenna said. "I guess you know most everyone."
"Not most everyone. Everyone," he said, flashing a warm smile.
38 comments:
As a dog lover I thought this was very plausible. Dog owners find it easy to chat. A nicely put together story and thanks to Mary Ann for scanning it and forwarding it to me.
I chat with other dog owners almost everyday I take my pup for a walk.
Another repeat title!
Cute story. Proves that animals sell. LOL
I noticed that too, Betsi. It wasn't that long ago either.
Hello! Hope everyone is doing good!
I just wanted to apologize to Chris. I never had a chance to thank you for your very helpful information on International Markets. I'm sorry I've been out of the loop, but have been dealing with some health and family issues. Thank you so much for your help!
Nicole
Sorry forgot to ask (and I'll apologize in advance if this is a silly question).
With the spelling differences between UK and USA English, is it necessary to change spelling to Queen's English? And if so, where would I find the correct spellings? Even though I know there are other differences (ex. a cooker in UK is called an oven) here. Etc.
Also, from what you have found, which magazine tends to pay the most?
Thanks :)
Nicole
Anon -- when you're working on something for a UK market, set your word processor's spelling option to English UK instead of English US. Then, when you type "favorite," it will change it to "favourite." And do a Google search for "British English" and you'll get a lot of hits for sites that can help you with translation. As for the payment, I can't help you with that, other than that they mostly pay less than WW, but better than nothing!
Nicole, just found this excellent link. http://www.englishclub.com/vocabulary/british-american.htm
Chris sent this to me for Word:
highlight all your text, go to Review on your icon bar, and click on 'Set Language'. Select English UK, then click OK. It should then underline in red all the words that need changing. If you right click on each word it will give you the alternatives.
Isn't the computer wonderful? Not like the old days when you had to struggle with a typewriter (do you remember those?) and white out. Oh? What was that?
Nicole, looks like everyone got there ahead of me! Hope you've got your health issues sorted now, as well as the spellcheck for UK spellings.
As to payment, Betsi's right, most mags do pay less than Woman's World - their dollar a word is exceptional. But there are still reasonable payers out there. In the UK we have Woman's Weekly and Fiction Feast, both of which are among the higher payers and therefore attract a lot of submissions. You would probably get between $200 and $400 for a story there to start with. You do have to submit by post, though, so there's a cost involved initially, especially from overseas (just as there is for us Brits submitting to WW).
Smaller payers but still good are Best, Weekly News, Yours, People's Friend and My Weekly (the Specials, not the weekly editions, where you have to have been published with them already to submit). With each of those you would get between $100 and $200. Not massive amounts, it's true, but enough to make the effort worthwhile.
Back up among the big guys is Fast Fiction in Australia. There's a sliding payscale there, depending on story length. Previously unpublished 900 word stories receive $400 (Australian), which works out at a little under that in US dollars. Top whack there is for a 2,800 word story, which pays $800 if previously unpublished. Knock off $100 in each case if the story has already had an outing elsewhere.
As well as spellings you were right to point out word differences too. You say bangs, we say fringe, you say gas, we say petrol, you say cookies, we say biscuits. Sidewalk is pavement, drugstore is chemist or pharmacy, cell phone is mobile phone, and so on. Having 'American' words wouldn't necessarily prevent a good story from being accepted, but it does mean more work for the editor. I'm always happy to take a look at stories before you submit to a British mag (although it's definitely a two-way street as I often need feedback too!), so let me know if you'd like to do that.
Chris, just want to mention that the payments you mention for the Fast Fiction mag are no longer correct. They have dropped payment to the lower payment you mentioned permanently to try and keep the magazine viable.
TK
Hi TK, yes, you're right. I've just checked my last email from Anthony and the rates are all set at the lower amounts. Sorry for the misinformation. Still, $700 is still a good return! Have you sent work in to them? How did you do?
I sell to them from time to time Chris, but I worry how long it will be an option. Could no doubt benefit from a lot more readers taking out subscriptions or buying the mag. Like most magazines these days.
TK
I purchased UK postage today -- printed directly onto my SASE -- at royalmail.com. It was charged to my credit card and the whole process was quite easy. What they call a "DL" envelope is close enough in size to our #10 that it worked just fine. Chris, you can do the same thing with US postage at stamps.com.
Thanks for that Betsi. I think between Jody and Mary Ann sending me US stamps I've got enough to last me for a while, but it's good to know there's another way.
TK, I agree about mags needing people to take out subscriptions to keep them going. Trouble for us writers is, if we did that for every magazine we submit work to our earnings would get gobbled up in no time. So I buy single copies of various mags in the supermarket every so often, just to keep up with what's being published. Not so easy to do with Australian mags, though, since I'm in the UK! But I do hope FF stays afloat, it's been a really good market for me for the past eight years and I'd hate to see it fail.
I should have known it was too easy to work -- printing the postage online is NOT going to work for our purposes. It turns out the postage is only good for about 48 hours. Why???
48 hours? The USPS cannot even deliver the original mailing in 48 hours. It takes three days to get from California to New Jersey and a lot longer than that to reach the UK. What brilliant mind thought up this debacle? Is there a postmark involved?
It doesn't have to be delivered in 48 hours, just POSTED within that time period -- which of course won't work for a SASE. This is the UK postal service, I don't know if the same rule applies if you go to stamps.com (USPS).
Yes, that was the point. 48 hours doesn't even get the mail containing the return SASE to its destination in 48 hours, much less allow time for the mailing of the SASE.
I am getting a little lost about who is where. I am in Southern California USA.I think eventually, all submissions must be done electronically. It may be that the day of print magazines is about over. Look at the kind of paper most have resorted to using. Even beautiful photographs often look dull. They can hardly give subscriptions away.
I think Real Simple is a beautiful magazine, and I enjoy O and HGTV and other home and food magazines. But there's no fiction! My sister said to me the other day, "Redbook has fiction, and Good Housekeeping, why don't you send stories to them?" I don't think she believed me when I told her she was wrong!
I'm in upstate New York, but my favorite place in the US is where YOU live, Mary Jo!
Mid-20th Century, all the women's slick (kind of paper!)magazines had three or four beautifully illustrated short stories every month. Then almost overnight, all of them switched to personal experience/how-to articles and have never looked back. Any short stories published in the US now are of the literary type. If you care to write that, then good luck.
Woman's World has the market now. I think I have given up on that. Two published and thirty turned down.
Betsi, it gets blazing hot here in the Inland Empire during the summer months. When going to school and working, I lived in San Francisco for four years. Loved that city! However, I understand now they have naked men running around on the streets and riding the cable cars. How about that?
Mary Jo,
Just a thought but why couldn't some of our romances be submitted as personal experience stories? Basically they're the same story told in first person. Become the character and tweak it so it becomes a 'lesson learned' story. What do you have to lose?
Jody, have you read any of those articles? Even in Woman's World? They are generally life-threatening illnesses or other super dramatic experiences. And I think they are supposed to be true.
I hope the information Chris has offered will lead to sales in other countries. Unfortunately, the opportunities available here in the US were before our time.
I'm puzzled by this stipulation that you need to use the UK's online postal payment in 48 hours, Betsi, but sadly not surprised. It's typical of how they come up with a good idea, then shoot themselves in the foot by making it darn nigh unusable. But the offer of a few UK stamps if anyone wants to try submitting stuff here is still on.
Don't forget all those mags that are happy to see email subs. Best, Weekly News, Yours (for older readers), You (in South Africa - I sold my third story to them just this week), That's Life and Fast Fiction in Oz. I know I've mentioned them all before but with these mags there's no need for the hassle of stamps.
And don't forget Ficta Fabula (the relaunched version of Pages of Stories) right there on your doorstep in Canada. I've been badgering you all for months to try sending your stuff out this way but how many of you have done it? Just a handful (good on you, ladies). As for the rest, consider yourselves glowered at!
As I've mentioned in emails to some of you, the stories you submit overseas can have much more to them than just the boy meets girl romances that Woman's World require. Give the characters some conflict to resolve, go beyond that initial meeting and take us further along their story. Forget romance altogether if you like, there's a wide range of needs out there. Family issues, humour, nostalgia, twist endings, there's a market for all of it.
It looks like actual stamps can be purchased online, in sheets. It says delivery is free, but I didn't get to the check-out point. It might say "to the US? Are you bonkers?"
Tweaking rejected WW romances by putting them in the first person is done by MANY of the authors on the WW loop all the time -- they then submit them to True Story and True Confessions, where, if they're lucky, they get 3 cents a word.
As for the personal essays, I survived peritonitis recently -- but I'm not sure I want to share my bowel problems with the world! Although if the pay is good enough... ;-)
Chris, I've submitted to 2 overseas markets now -- and I'm excited about the opportunity to write something besides "boy meets girl!"
Do they still publish those confession magazines? I do not recall seeing any of them on sale for a very long time. If they don't sell them, maybe that is why they can't pay much.
Yes, confession mags are still around. The last publisher (Dorchester) sold them, and the new owners (True Renditions) kept publishing the 2 titles I mentioned. I saw them in my grocery store for a while, but not recently. I don't think sales could be great, but the authors I know who sell to them are getting paid on time and are happier than they were in the Dorchester days. The payment hasn't changed since I first sold to them in the 80's, except some used to pay 5 cents a word. It's easy money -- or at least it used to be. With only 2 titles, there's a lot more competition now.
Mary Jo,
"And I think they are supposed to be true."
I think I read in the Trues guidelines that the stories should 'appear' to be true, or they 'could be' true. Something like that. They don't put the author's name on the piece so that it looks like Sue Ellen from Little Town actually wrote it. They don't pay much. And I hear True authors saying they don't pay with any regularity like Betsi said. They sort of remind me of the old National Enquirer...kind of a rag.
oops I read that too fast. Betsi said she knows authors who ARE getting paid on time.
Yup . . . and Mary Jo said the personal essays are "supposed to be true," she wasn't talking about confessions.
Oh, and the Trues aren't at all like the Enquirer. They're far from literature -- I didn't mind that my real name wasn't on the stories -- but they aren't trash. Jody, I believe you're a member of the Yahoo Trues group, so I'm surprised you'd say that.
Betsi, Yes, I joined the Trues thread to see what it was all about. It's a nice group of people. I checked the mags out on FB. Got their guidelines. Got a sample magazine. I don't knock anyone who wants to write for them, but I found that the Trues aren't for me. "We had to hide our love" "I dated my sister's husband" "It was his dying wish" To me that's very National Enquirer. You equated being a rag with being trashy, not me. I just think it's a not very classy publication and it's a bit cheesy.
You sure do like to jump all over me every chance you get. Ease up a bit. We're both writers looking for the same thing, enjoying a little chit-chat with fellow authors.
Thank you so much Betsi, Jody, and Chris :)
I absolutley LOVE this website. You all are a wonderful bunch of people!
I can't wait to take a look at the link Betsi.
Also, I have to agree with Mary Jo's commment: "Look at the kind of paper most have resorted to using. Even beautiful photographs often look dull."
I, too, have noticed the poor paper quality, especially with "Victorian Homes" magazine. I used to love the magazine, and the photos were gorgeous on heavy paper. Now, the paper feels as thin as an onion peeling :(
Chris, I used to get a subscription to Woman's World (right now, I've temporarily cancelled it) but still have copies of the fiction pieces that I've kept in a big folder. Do you think it might be helpful to scan a copy of some of the stories, and send to one another? I could send you a few stories, and perhaps you could send me a few from a couple of the British magazines so that we could both get an idea of what they are looking for?
Also, I was thinking that maybe all of us on this board should consider publishing a collection of our short stories together? Doesn't Amazon have a way to do that? Not sure, haven't looked into it. Just a thought!
Thank you for all your help!
Nicole
P.S.
Chris,
I was just looking at Fast Fiction's website, but am a little confused. Do they also publish cute-meet romances like Woman's World? Just making sure I'm not barking up the wrong tree with them :)
Thanks,
Nicole
Hi Nicole,
Sorry for butting in here, but no, they don't take the type of story you would find in Woman's World.
Also, just wanted to mention that if sending to other markets overseas make sure you know what Rights they want. Yours magazine, for example, takes All Rights.
Nicole,
Thanks for the offer of scanned WW stories but I've got quite a few on file now from Betsi, Jody, Mary Ann and others, so I think I'm getting more of a feel for what they use. But I am happy to send you some copies of UK mags. My email is csutton45@hotmail.com
If you contact me on that, putting something recognisable in the subject box, we'll take it from there.
No, as I've said several times on this site, FF will not take exactly the same sort of story that WW do. To be frank I can't think of any mag that would. WW is one of a kind in the type of story it uses. I'm not putting down the writing. From what I have seen, all the WW writers have skill and imagination, it's just a shame that they aren't allowed to develop any great storyline beyond boy meeting girl. No one in these stories is allowed to have any sort of problem or defect. It's like Never-Neverland for adults; Romeo and Juliet without the gangs and poison. The reason I keep pressing the ladies (and maybe gents) on this website to broaden their writing horizons is because they all write well and deserve a bigger audience and further financial reward.
Now, this issue of Rights. We'll go with Yours because that's the one that's been mentioned (Hi Anon - can we know your name?) Yours is for older readers, what's called the 'grey market'. Never in a million years are they going to publish a romance where a mid-twenties or -thirties girl meets a similarly aged man and goes for dinner. Not going to happen. But if that story has one of the matchmaking grannies so beloved by WW, and the story can be retold from Granny's POV - she's worried that her too studious granddaughter isn't getting any fun out of life and arranges for her to accidentally visit on the same day that the fun-loving young handyman from up the road is doing some work about the house - NOW you might have something. The bones of the story will be the same but by changing the perspective you are meeting Yours' criteria regarding the main character's age as well as the need for exclusivity. Change the names (easily done using control/F), add a bit of friction (the girl is initially narky about the obvious set-up), change the location to an English (or for FF, Australian) one, and you no longer have the same story. Come up with a new title and, bingo, there you go.
I mentioned Romeo and Juliet earlier. People who went to see that might have hated West Side Story, and vice versa, yet fundamentally it's the same. Different names, different location, different centuries even, but otherwise the same story.
Don't forget that these magazines are continents apart - the chances of anyone in Oz or the UK having seen your story in WW are slim. It's true there are some British mags that now sell versions overseas, like Woman's Weekly and My Weekly, and in those cases I wouldn't suggest submitting simultaneously in case both ended up wanting to publish at the same time. That would be tricky. Otherwise, as long as the story has enough changes to be substantially different from the original, I personally see no problem.
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