Fiction Ed’s Blog: About Response Times
This week, Lucy’s looking at how long you can expect to wait for a response, once you’ve submitted a short story.
We Read Everything!
The first thing to say is that if you submit a short story, poem or pocket novel to The People’s Friend, it will definitely be read.
We read everything!
If You’re A Published Author
If you’ve had one or more stories published in the Friend, feel free to contact your assigned editor if you’ve submitted a story and haven’t had a decision within 12-16 weeks.
Why It May Take Longer
If your story is a word count, season or theme which we don’t need straight away, we may read other stories first.
So, for example, if you send in a Christmas story in November, when the Christmas stories have already been chosen, your story won’t be read until around May at the earliest.
This is because we need to prioritise the stories which we’ll be scheduling first.
We also always receive more 1200-word stories than we need.
And we always advise authors to send stories in six months ahead of publication.
If You’re An Unpublished Friend Author
If you’ve never had a story published in the “Friend”, submissions are via our dedicated email address.
As we have no longer have a postal backlog to contend with, responses to USMs are very speedy at the moment, with one member of the team going into the inbox every day.
Our Team have a wealth of experience to draw on, and are well trained in quickly spotting what will, and what won’t, work for us.
But even if your story is returned the same day, it will have been read and considered carefully.
About Feedback
The “Friend” now receives an increased volume of submissions, due to other avenues for authors being closed down.
We no longer provide detailed feedback to unpublished authors, to allow us to prioritise effectively.
If you’d like to write for the “Friend”, it’s helpful to read the magazine regularly, and check the guidelines.
