There are thousands of magazines and websites that publish short stories. Submitting to all of them would be expensive, time-consuming, and futile. You MUST narrow the field and send your story to the publications that are most likely to publish it. In other words, you have to find a "fit." To narrow the field, ask yourself these questions:
- Is this your first time submitting a story for publication? If so, you probably want to stick to smaller magazines or those that specifically try to help out novice writers.
- Do you want to make money from getting the story published? OK, so that's a stupid question. But do you need to get paid? If so, good luck. Even the most highly respected literary journals won't pay for stories. To make serious cash, shoot for big glossy publications with a hefty bankroll. Either that, or try to publish a book of a collection of your own short stories. To do that, check out our article SYW publish a book? However, for your first short story, you should really just be satisfied with getting it published in an unpaid journal.
- Is it crucial to see your story printed on paper? If not, then online literary sites might be your best bet. There are a lot of them and it still counts as a legitimate publication. The downside is that there's no guarantee that the story will get read.
- Is it crucial that a lot of people read your story? Again, there are a number of microscopically small journals with circulations in the dozens that may consent to publish your story if you're not particularly worried about being known to readers coast-to-coast.
- Does your story have a particular ideological/cultural background that others may identify with? This is the question that many first-time writers forget to think about. There are dozens of magazines out there for all conceivable ethnic, cultural and religious groups, as well as lifestyle magazines for people with particular hobbies or occupations as well as magazines for geographic regions. Figure out the target audience for your story and you'll improve your chances of catching an appropriate editor's eye.
- Are you willing to pay to have your story read? This is a question that even successful and established writers often struggle with. There are hundreds of short fiction contests across the country with prizes ranging anywhere from $50 to a couple grand. If you think your story can win, you can shell out the $10 - $15 per entry. Just make sure that the contests are reputable: find out who last year's winners were, and make sure these are real people, and that your story will get read. Many smaller magazines have required reading fees, but every submitter gets a free subscription to the magazine - if you're interested in reading short stories as well as writing them, this is a good way to feel like you're not getting bilked out of your reading fees.
- Do you have any connections that might be able to help you? This doesn't just apply to you if your dad edits Harper's. Almost every college and most towns have a literary magazine, and if you're interested in being published you might want to get to know some editors. They'll be able to give you inside tips on what the magazine is looking for, and if they like you they'll probably read your stuff first.
