1 for 3

Saying "another rejection" makes it sound worse than it is. Out of three submissions, I've had one acceptance, so at the moment that's still pretty good. I know the number of subs the market has been receiving has also been increasing, so I'm not upset about it.

I do sometimes worry that my stories lack something that I can only describe as "sophistication". I've been thinking about this for a while, trying to figure out how to express what I mean. It's not necessarily that the stories are simplistic, or the work of a juvenile writer. (The feeling that I'm still a teenager trying to write like an adult is a not entirely separate issue but more about how being trans skews perspective than about the stories themselves.) Rather, I think I struggle with condensing plot down to short story length, and end up with stories I'm not entirely satisfied with (unsophisticated) because I've had to pare down so much.

I should face the fact that I'm most comfortable writing in the long story to novella range and focus on my strengths, I think. Which means I should finish Carnival first and foremost, and polish it, and work on Node revisions.

Thoughts on lacking plot when I lack strong characters need a separate post.