Whisper House Press

Notes from the desk of the editor are offered in the interests of personal posterity and transparency for writers and other potential editors who wish to learn from my experience.

the editor

I try to update backers regularly, since in my own backing of 75+ projects over the years there’s nothing worse than a project that appears to be dead in the water because its creator is incommunicado. Even if there’s not a lot to report, keeping backers updated is critical. If your project isn’t failing, don’t make it appear to be so. I’ll leave it at that.

This week, I did indeed receive an updated (including cover specs, which must change with any page count changes) test copy of Costs of Living. I scanned it for the errors I’d hoped to fix, flipped through in search of possible new concerns, and declared the book to be complete. Into a postal envelope it went. I had this one pre-addressed to Ellen Datlow, editor of Best Horror of the Year, for her consideration. (She’ll get Dread Mondays, too, when it’s done.)

This is something I hadn’t even thought to wonder about before I began this publishing project, but to get recognition for our work, we often have to submit it. To whom, you ask? We find the trade publications, magazines, journals, reviewers, and committees in charge of various outlets, and we ask them kindly to consider our work. If you want to be in the running for the HWA’s Bram Stoker Award, you can submit it to the appropriate jury .(How do we do this? I still have to learn… but it’s a moot point until after this year’s Stoker awards). If you want Locus magazine to review the work, you need to send them a copy (I had to send a copy of Costs of Living to a reviewer in Greece). Want someone on TikTok to review your work? Send them an ARC and ask nicely. Is there a podcast that might be curious to interview you? Reach out.

In the meantime, while Costs of Living is doing great and things are on track with that process, I have two other items of concern: first is editing Dread Mondays (I’ve got about 15 stories to edit, still), and the other is my French residency (I’m honored to have an opportunity to spend three weeks as an artist-in-residence at Chateau d’Orquevaux this summer, and there I’m committed to work on my own two novel projects and get them as close to done as possible).

It’s hard to follow up my last post, which was about style guides and style sheets, but I wanted to keep you, like my Kickstarter backers, up to date on the publication process and on what I’m learning along the way.

– steve

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