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Tue, 19 Dec 2006 We're currently knee-deep in manuscripts; it's been quite a fruitful submission period, and it will continue until the end of this month (and most likely later, if a lot of people wait until the last minute to send). One thing I've noticed about the submissions is that there seem to be some authors who pay special attention to guidelines, and some do not. Our guidelines are very specific about how we're different from other poetry publishers--particularly our emphasis on book sales and author involvement in that process--and we ask authors to demonstrate they have some understanding of our approach. The authors who, in their cover letters, show they understand our approach tend to do a lot better in the submission process than authors who simply fire off a generic cover letter--or don't include a cover at all. Authors who submit to lots of contests are used to not providing a lot of information with their manuscript, because that information tends to get removed by screening panels. But we want this information. No sense in wasting our, and the author's, time, if he or she is uncomfortable taking an active role in doing readings and other activities to help promote that author's book book, should we decide to publish it. Of course, it goes without saying that if the writer's work isn't good enough, no amount of promotional enthusiasm will persuade us to publish it. But that additional information can, and often does, make the difference when we are evaluating two equally good manuscripts. |
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