Giant monsters everywhere

We've been seeing a lot of giant-monster stories lately.

I've been assuming that most of them were rejected by one or another of the Daikaiju! giant-monster anthologies. The second volume came out last summer, and the third last fall, so the timing is approximately right for the rejected stories to be washing up on our shores and stomping and roaring through our slushpile.

I've got nothing against giant-monster stories. But as with anything that we see a lot of, such stories are getting to be kind of a hard sell for me.

I'm not putting it on the stories-we've-seen-too-often list yet, 'cause I think it's a temporary thing--I suspect that after this wave passes, giant monsters will go back to being a rarity in submissions to us.

But if you were thinking of sending us your giant-monster story in the next few days, might be best to send something else instead.

3 Responses to “Giant monsters everywhere”

  1. Debby B.

    Does it effect your judgement knowing a different editor probably rejected this story?

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  2. Debby B.

    I meant affect!

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  3. Jed

    For most people, it makes sense to submit any given story to higher-profile markets than SH first. So I tend to assume that any story we see has already been rejected by one or more of Asimov’s, F&SF, Analog, or Realms of Fantasy, and often others as well. Not always true (some stories that we’ve rejected have later sold to some of the bigger magazines), but pretty likely.

    Fortunately, different editors have different tastes; there are lots of stories that we buy that other editors might not, and vice versa. So the fact that a story’s been rejected elsewhere doesn’t make much difference to me.

    (That said, once or twice I’ve seen cover letters that say things like “This story has been rejected by dozens of other editors, ’cause they couldn’t see how brilliant it is. I’m hoping you’ll be smarter.” This is not a good way to get an editor interested in your work.)

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