Craft Literary holds a first chapter contest every year. Writers can submit up to the first 5000 words of their book. I sent my first three chapters, which came to a little over 4300 words. First through third place winners all get published in Craft, and win some pretty nice monetary prizes. There are other little goodies offered, as well, that I'm not sure I would take. One of the prizes is an agent query workshop, but since I don't intend to publish traditionally, I don't need it. I wonder if the prizes are transferrable? Like, if I won, if I could give that particular gem to someone who I know could use it? That would be nice.

Anyway, they will be publishing the winners in the December issue, so I should be finding out in the next few months if I made the cut. I have no idea how many other authors submit to this contest, so I could be up against a few hundred or several thousand. Who knows?

I also submitted a ghost story to an online horror magazine and I should hear back from them in the next few weeks. I've also been making note of magazines and publications taking short stories and intend to do some more short story writing and submitting stories, as well. It's good practice! I found a handful of different places that I think I would like to submit to: Luna Station Quarterly, The Lorelei Signal, Dragon Soul Press, and Seems A Little Crazy! are all publications that look like interesting possibilities.

There are so many publications out there with so many themes, wants, and desires. I'm bound to find something that clicks!