My fire hasn’t been flickering very steadily these days. I’ve progressed with a couple of story ideas and gotten farther in my current short piece, but the gas is running low. As I mentioned before, more fuel must be gathered in order to roar it back to life. Having read almost all of the books I own (and not really wanting to dive into any of the other ones), I decided to take a quick walk to my local bookstore. My goal was to pick out several magazines that I would potentially want to write for. When I got there, I was disappointed by the selection. Meager at best, peppered with a lot of snobby “literary” journals and not much else. The issues I was able to snag were slightly beaten with a healthy dose of dust attached. I wasn’t expecting shelves upon shelves, but I expected a little more than a pittance. Then again, I shouldn’t have been surprised with the large number of markets either suspending their operations or closing altogether. For those who are curious, this is what I ended up snagging.
- Fantasy & Science Fiction (F&SF) – A staple of the industry having been published since 1949.
- Analog Science Fiction and Fact – Another golden oldie that’s been around since 1930.
- Asimov’s Science Fiction – You really can’t go wrong with the classic markets. I remember first reading it in my school’s library in Costa Rica. I devoured every issue they had in stock.
- Writer’s Digest – How can I be a wanna-be writer and NOT get this standby?
- The Writer – This is a new one for me. Never picked it up before, but the selection was so limited I decided to get everything they had.
- Zoetrope: All-Story – Another new publication for me, started by Senor Coppola back in 1997.
So far I’ve only dived into the Writer’s Digest. It has an interview with Stephen King AND Jerry B. Jenkins, which is an interesting pairing to say the least. Hopefully this is the tinder I need to get me going again.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
In defense of snobby lit journals!!! lol!
seriously though, i have heard wonderful things about Zoetrope but have not grabbed a copy. Que opinas?
Twitter: gabrielnovo
May 15, 2009 at 1:12 pm
So far this magazine is great. It’s the Latin American issue with guest “designer” Guillermo del Toro, which means the entire publication is illustrated with drawings from his diaries. The stories are translated from South American authors and quite riveting. If I was to ever pick this up, now was a great time to start.
I do this too to get inspired, but I never seem to walk out with anything in my hands. Just being in the store seems to restart the flame, even if it’s just a little bit.
My big concern at the moment is the number of times i find myself going to the store for inspiration. Seems to be too often for someone who wants to call himself a published author.