SFFMP 61: Using Short Fiction for “Gatekeeper Cred” and Editing Tips with Mike Reeves-McMillian
Today we chatted with Mike Reeves-McMillian, former copy editor with a publishing house and current writer of short and novel-length speculative fiction. He shared some tips for self-editing and talked about how short story sales can still be useful and what it means to be a “light hybrid author.”
Here are a few more notes from our discussion:
- Using short story sales to gain “gatekeeper cred.”
- Why Mike likes magazines and anthologies rather than attempting to sell novels to houses (they’re “less rightsy-grabby,” have a quicker turn-around, and you end up making more per word than is typical with novel advances).
- Sites for finding short story markets: Duotrope (fee) and The Submission Grinder (free)
- Tips for catching errors in your own work (such as changing fonts and reading upside down — yes, really).
- Some of the common editing errors he sees, both in self-published work and in traditionally published books.
- Clippings, a tool that will will take the output of your Kindle notes and highlights and transform it into a spreadsheet or several other formats.
Check out Mike’s novels and short stories, and of course his helpful The Well-Presented Manuscript: Just What You Need to Know to Make Your Fiction Look Professional. (You can find quite a bit of free information on the page for his book.)
To see his reviews for speculative fiction, visit The Review Curmudgeon. He’s also active on Google+.
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