Friday, November 2, 2007

Are some publishing credits more equal than others?

How impressive are anthologies, small magazines or e-zines and small press credits of writers to agents? Are e-zine credits of less worth than the others (with the notoriety of the internet and all)? Or since they are mostly done with small print runs are they all not particularly interesting credits unless you have a full book published and sold?

Other agents may be different, but I don't mind much about the specifics of where authors have had small pieces published - those credits indicate that they've been writing for a little while and sending things out, and that's more important than where they are. Of course, if one of them is The New Yorker then you will get extra credit ...

Also, no matter how many credits you have, it will mean nought if your manuscript isn't any good. If I don't like the manuscript I won't hang onto it just in case the credits make me change my mind - because, six months later, it still won't be publishable. So don't fret too much about where you're getting things published - just get out there!

1 comment:

Josephine Damian said...

I've been asking myself this question since, so far, I only have an e-zine fiction piece "published" and a non-fic piece published in a trade mag... I'm still in the game, sending out stuff.

Thanks for the post.