Planning on submitting a manuscript?

I apologize for this much-neglected blog. My personal and work life has been VERY busy these past few months, and most of my writing focus has been elsewhere. But I'm still alive, working on new projects, and loving my acquisitions job at Deseret Book!

That brings me to my next announcement: Deseret Book / Shadow Mountain is transitioning to an online-only submissions process!! HOORAY!!

What does this mean exactly?

Well, let me tell you!

It means 1) Less work for me on the acquisitions/reviewing end, 2) Less of a wait for you as an author submitting a manuscript, and 3) Overall happiness due to such a smooth, easy process. A win-win, in my opinion.

Soooo, if you're planning on submitting a manuscript to Deseret Book or Shadow Mountain, please read our newly updated guidelines first:

Deseret Book: http://submissions.deseretbook.com/guidelines
Shadow Mountain: http://submissions.shadowmountain.com/guidelines

These sites will direct you to where you can submit/upload a query, synopsis, chapter samples, and/or a full manuscript.  They will also prompt you to give the intended audience and genre. After August 1, we will not be accepting any submissions by mail or email.

Now, I get lots of questions about distinguishing between Deseret Book and our imprint, Shadow Mountain. The guidelines are pretty clear, but let me elaborate. Although everything goes through the same review channels (aka me), it's helpful if you submit to the correct imprint based on the intended audience/genre of your manuscript. As a general rule, anything that includes LDS-content (fiction or non-fiction) should be submitted through Deseret Book, and anything geared towards a national, non-LDS market (fiction or non-fiction) should be submitted through Shadow Mountain.

If you have any questions, please let me know! (My work email can be found on the websites.) I'm happy to help and make this new transition run as smoothly as possible. I think it will pay off for everyone in the long run.

With that, happy writing and submitting, Everyone!!

[Note: this post is NOT an official message from Deseret Book or in any way legally binding. Please visit the websites linked above to learn more.]

Rejections with Humor

My husband found these for me, and I thought I'd share them with all you writers and editors out there. Of course, being one who sends out rejection letters, I found these especially funny. (Maybe I have a twisted sense of humor? ;))

 

 (Hopefully my rejections never sound this harsh!)

(Comics found at http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1994-06-27/)