#0008 Duotrope is what, exactly?
The best kind of info dump*
I’m discovering that Duotrope is a multifaceted amalgamation of stuff. Instead of lazily pasting the first paragraph from the about page, let me share with you some of the myriad ways to use your Duotrope subscription.
Scenario #1: I’ve got piles of poetry, where do I submit?
Coolio (not jealous)! Grab the first poem. Under the Search tab, Search for Publishers top choice, toggle on Poetry, under the Basics tab answer the bold pull-down menu choices — Poetry Form, Genre, Style, Length Type, and Submission Type — and hit the green Search button. There’s your submission list. (Obviously, you need to look at each open call for submissions to find out if your poem fits the call, etc. Do the legwork, er, keyboard tapping?)
Scenario #2: I need inspiration. What’s a creative to do?
No worries (been there)! Under the News tab, Theme & Deadline Calendar (second from bottom), Filter Themes & Deadlines by category. Hit the Filter button. Lots of springboards for your next creation. (Have you heard of 3Elements Literary Review? Every quarter, three words as the theme/prompt. Past issues list the three words on the cover. Boom!)
Scenario #3: How do I crack the nut of what the lit mag really wants?
Trying to actually get your creative self-expression accepted for publication? Not really honing in on the theme of 100 Rejections Club, but okay… Under the Interviews tab, Editor Interviews top choice. Did you just notice the only other choice under this tab is Agent Interviews? Yup. Try not to get distracted. Filter Editor Interviews by category. Hit the Filter button. There’s hundreds of full interviews posted, or you can filter by Question. Dig deep. Do all the research.
Scenario #4: Where should I submit to get lots of rejections fast?
Begin under the Reports tab, Publication Response Statistics top choice, filter Report by The Extremely Challenging and filter Category for Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, or Visual Art. Hit the Show button. Voilà, a list, but not so fast; you’re not done. You wanted your rejections to come back at a rapid pace, remember? Click the first publication link, scroll down to the Submission Statistics. To the right of the pie chart is a bar graph, with the second bar from the top labeled Rejections. That bar shows you how many days it took for others to receive their Rejections from the publication. (The diamond is the average number of days per Rejection.) Numerical statistics appear below the pies and bars. Whew.
Those are but four ways Duotrope delivers. I didn’t even get into Duosuma (bless you!) or the Control Panels (personal and group). Some other time.
Next time: Taking the sting out of rejection. (Maybe.)
*In the subhead I was alluding to literary info dumping not the love language of certain autistic and/or ADHD folks.