What if I Win?

Congratulations! Now the rest of your work begins.

First, if you didn’t already include such a clause in your initial e-mail to us, we’re going to make you send us an e-mail that clearly states that your work is your original, unpublished creation, at least as far as you know.

Second, we edit your story (see below).

Third, when your story has been edited to our mutual satisfaction, we’ll formally ask you for HTML and PDF publication rights. We’ll send you a contract (electronic unless you insist on hardcopy), and you’ll have to sign it and send it back to us.

Finally, within two weeks of receiving your contract (and usually sooner), we will send you your check, or pay you by other agreed-upon means.

Editing Stories

We hope you’ll work with us as we edit your story. Our goal is to bring out the best story you have inside you, given our considerable time constraints. On a tactical level, our goal, to paraphrase editorial consultant Alan D. Williams, is to ensure that:

1. Every part of your story says what you want it to say; and

2. You’re saying what you want to say as clearly and consistently as possible.

We have a third goal of our own, which is difficult to achieve, but we always strive for it:

3. To make every sentence in your published version as good as the best sentence in your submitted version.

(We have yet to receive a submission without at least one weak sentence somewhere.)

If you want to see our editing in action, Blanche Kapustin, the guest writer for Issue #3, agreed to let us show you our edited version of her initial draft of the story we eventually published. The edited version can be downloaded as a PDF. And here is the final, published version of her story.

Note how she accepted some of our suggestions, but not all, and how she often changed things in different ways than we suggested. Her decisions were fine with us. We are here to help YOU tell YOUR story better, not to turn you into clones of ourselves.