Weeks 39 & 40 — Year of Short Stories 2026

2026 is another year of short stories. In this weekly series, I track my short story writing, from idea and draft to submission. This is for the period of Sept 28 – Oct 11. Stats for the Year Stories Finished: 3 Submissions Currently Out: 7 Submissions Total: 38 Rejections: 33 Acceptances: 0 Submissions and Responses I received two rejections this week, one for Beneath the House at Caen, and one for Taco Cat. I also gave up on two submissions: one to a publisher that only responds for acceptances (Caen) and another that supposedly does, but never replied to mine—or it got lost in the spam filters (Taco Cat). This left both stories in a totally unsubmitted state, which is anathema to the working writer. I found one publisher to send Taco Cat and two for Caen. Goals My goals from last week: Start Magpie revisions Continue idea writing In my last entry, I was happy to be picking up some steam and writing regularly. The past two weeks, I’ve been struggling to get much writing done at all.…