Publishing updates, August 2026

Four months on from April:

• 14 pieces
• 119 total submissions
• 80 rejections
• 8 personalized rejections
• 2 short lists
• 1 long list
• 1 published (short CNF)
• 2 accepted, forthcoming (novella & a short story)

Has turned into:

• 19 pieces: 1 novella, 5 short CNF, 13 short stories
• 196 total submissions
• 126 rejections
• 12 personalized rejections
• 2 short lists
• 1 long list
• 3 published
• 2 accepted, forthcoming

“Unknown Caller” went live at Pithead Chapel today, Vol. 15, Issue 8. Short CNF. This has been one of my target journals since I started and it’s really exciting to have something land there.

“Triptych” was picked up by Wordgathering, a journal of disability poetry and literature out of Syracuse. Also short CNF. I’ll link it when it’s up. This one took 24 submissions to land, which is the longest road any of my pieces has walked. I had to do a lot of thinking about market fit and pivot a couple of times. It’s kinda-sorta a prose poem and provides no resolution. It’s also almost pure sensory overwhelm. Turns out, the band for that type of thing is narrow.

I’ve gotten a much better handle on fit-to-venue and feel like I’m starting to hone in on the places that publish things that are shaped like the things I write.

I’m not really feeling anything from the rejections. There are a few I’ve been bummed about (“I really thought this was a good fit and like this magazine.”), but generally I don’t have any expectations, so getting told “no” hasn’t been hard to handle.

The bigger adjustment is internalizing how much time everything takes. Months until you hear back, months until it hits and/or you can post anything about an acceptance or publication. Just lots of waiting.

I’m still trying to navigate who I share things with and build comfort around the level of vulnerability some of my pieces have. I’m not embarrassed by anything I’ve written, but some things might hurt feelings (with or without context) or be misunderstood. I’ve just not built up the right framework for thinking through those problems yet and have defaulted to “open,” while also not doing much targeted sharing with the folks in my sphere.

The path I want to chart is one where I’m just me, take it or leave it, but that’s not how most of us are wired by default, so it takes effort to arrive there.