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Random things make a podcast post
Jan. 19th, 2019 12:35 pmI had a bit of a podcast-guest drought over the turn of the year. I'm getting a bunch of interviews on the schedule that should cover most of the first half of the year, but don't currently have anyone recorded for February. It makes me a bit twitchy, but since I officially announced that the week 2 & 3 shows will be less structured going forward, that gives me leeway to pull something out of my ass at the last minute if necessary.
What I can't pull out of my ass are submissions for the fiction series. The month is essentially 2/3 gone and I have no (zero) submissions yet. And, yes, I've had some verbal confirmations of intent. But I'm seriously worrying I won't even get four submissions, much less enough that I can choose the four best from a strong field like last year. What the hell am I doing wrong? You'd think that, given the usual token royalties offered for lesbian short fiction, the prospect of getting $300 for a 5000 word short story--just as if I were a professional mainstream venue and everything--would stir people's interest. There's a lot of talk about how people want good f/f historical fiction to read, and a lot of griping from authors about how hard it is to sell it. So where's the disconnect?
I suppose it would simplify my life in future years to give up on the fiction series. (It would certainly save me the angst of trying to shift it from a loss leader to a self-supporting project at some point.) But I really liked the idea of supporting the genre this way.
At least I have a solid set of titles for the new/recent books segment. There's even one that looked interesting enough that I ordered it. (Only Kindle and hard copy so I went for hard copy.) And I loved doing the group movie review/analysis. And I'm commissioning transcripts of the interview shows. (Though I'm not aiming for real-time posting yet. Working on the backlog first.)
What I can't pull out of my ass are submissions for the fiction series. The month is essentially 2/3 gone and I have no (zero) submissions yet. And, yes, I've had some verbal confirmations of intent. But I'm seriously worrying I won't even get four submissions, much less enough that I can choose the four best from a strong field like last year. What the hell am I doing wrong? You'd think that, given the usual token royalties offered for lesbian short fiction, the prospect of getting $300 for a 5000 word short story--just as if I were a professional mainstream venue and everything--would stir people's interest. There's a lot of talk about how people want good f/f historical fiction to read, and a lot of griping from authors about how hard it is to sell it. So where's the disconnect?
I suppose it would simplify my life in future years to give up on the fiction series. (It would certainly save me the angst of trying to shift it from a loss leader to a self-supporting project at some point.) But I really liked the idea of supporting the genre this way.
At least I have a solid set of titles for the new/recent books segment. There's even one that looked interesting enough that I ordered it. (Only Kindle and hard copy so I went for hard copy.) And I loved doing the group movie review/analysis. And I'm commissioning transcripts of the interview shows. (Though I'm not aiming for real-time posting yet. Working on the backlog first.)
