Melissa Llanes Brownlee

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Publication. Wondrous and Strange.

The day before yesterday, my short story “Ulu’s Gift” was published online at the Mud City Journal. My last short story “Uncle Willy’s Harbor” was published in the Notre Dame Review earlier this year.

Most of my stories from my short story collection have found a home, and I am very grateful for that. I never would have thought that two years ago, when I started to send out my work after being on hiatus from writing, school and all of that since I graduated from UNLV in 2008, I would be able to find a home for any of them let alone almost all of them.

It’s indeed wondrous.

The strange part comes from what stories got picked up, by which publication and when. My acceptances have mainly been at online journals with two being from print. I never really know why a story gets accepted or rejected. I can only assume it’s because they either like what I do or they don’t.

Every editor, every publisher, I know they are looking for work that will suit whatever their personal aesthetics are. I can’t be upset with that. Of course, knowing that doesn’t make the rejection any easier to take.

Duotrope and Submittable both make it super easy to keep submitting your work, especially with rejection after rejection…and believe me it took a lot for me to get over that shitty feeling when your work gets rejected (I haven’t completely gotten over it but I can mostly manage the inevitable depression after one too many).

I try very hard not to read too much into why something was rejected. If I did, I would never turn around and resubmit. At this point in the year, I have submitted my work over seventy times. That’s not bad for half a year’s work.