Submitting Short Stories to Online Magazines

So you've written a short story and you want to submit it to a magazine. A good place to start would be online magazines, also called ezines. The internet has allowed lovers of fiction to create magazines without having to worry about the costs involved with traditional printing. As a result, there are thousands of fiction ezines, some upstarts and some with a long history, that you could send your story to.

There are a lot of short story market lists that can help you choose the right ezine for your work. Duotrope.com has one of the most user-friendly search engines available. It will sort magazines, both online and print, according to genre, word count, and pay. It will also tell you how long the response time for each magazine is.

Once you have your list of potential markets for your story, you need to check out the ezine's site. It's important to read a few stories to get a feel for what the editor likes. Being within a certain genre does not necessarily mean the ezine is a good fit for your story.

After you choose the ezine you want to send your story to, you need to read the submission guidelines very carefully. Some editors will automatically reject submissions that disregard the guidelines. Guidelines vary from ezine to ezine, but here are some basics:

1. Most short story markets want the entire manuscript along with a cover letter. Do not send a query. Queries in short fiction are used mainly to check the status of submissions.

2. Ezines take email submissions. The email address is usually found in the guidelines. Check and double check to make sure you send it to the correct place. Otherwise, your submission will bounce back to you, get sent to someone you didn't intend to send it to, or get lost in the ether.

3. Some guidelines will also state what they want the subject line of the email to be. If there is no specific subject line stated, then write "Fiction Submission: Story Title."

4. Check the ezine's masthead to make sure you address your cover letter to the correct person. Ideally, that would be the fiction editor. If there is no fiction editor, then address your cover letter to the editor-in-chief. Always address the person properly and use his or her name unless there is no masthead or there are several fiction editors. Only then is it okay to use "Dear Editor."

5. Cover letters should be kept short and professional. Editors would rather read your story than a letter. The first paragraph shouldn't be any longer than a sentence or two. State that you're sending your submission, titled "Your Story," and the word count. The second paragraph should be a 50-100 word bio. If your work has been published before, mention a couple places. Otherwise, don't mention previous publications at all. Close your cover letter by thanking the editor for his or her time. Include your email address and any other pertinent information after your name at the bottom.

6. Some ezines want stories attached to the email and some want them pasted in. Their preference will be stated in the guidelines. If the story is attached, make sure you double space the document. If you're pasting, use single spaced lined with double spaces between paragraphs. If you're pasting from a Microsoft word document, make sure you replace all your smart quotes before you copy and paste. If you don't, your story could have odd symbols in it by the time the ezine receives it.

7. Before hitting send, proofread both your cover letter and your story. Always send the version of the story you're happiest with. Editors will not accept revised versions of stories currently under consideration unless they request them.

Once you've done all this, you're good to go. If your work gets rejected, send it to another publication. Remember, sometimes it can take many rejections before your story is accepted and published.