# Hearth Stories (2)

This is largely in regards to my previous post about starting a
science-fiction/fantasy magazine...

Well, the magazine I started has been going well so far. I got
such a huge response to opening submissions that I shortened the
reading period from three months to one month. That month ended
on September 6th. In that time I received 572 submissions. I
accepted 10 of those (1.75%). All of the authors have been paid
and contracts have been signed. I have been working on the epub
here and there. I'll have to redo some of the markup (which I do
mostly by hand) after editing is done on the pieces, but I like
having a fluid and moving document that I _build_ as I work. I
got cover art worked out recently too.

I think I got 10 really wonderful short stories that fit very
much the vibe of what I was hoping to release. So I am really
quite excited about the issue. It will come out on the winter
solstice (northern hemisphere)—the calendar recognition of the
winter solstice anyway (the 21st of December).

Over 200 of those more than 500 submissions all came in on the
last three days of the submission window. It was grueling. If
you are a writer submitting to magazines/journals: do not wait
until the last days of the submission window. I had already
filled all but one spot by that point. So I did a _lot_ of
reading for that one spot and was very very tired of reading
by that point, as the people that waited until the end tended
for some reason to not read the submission guidelines and not
fit at all what we were looking for. Though the one that we did
take to fill that last spot is, I think, one of the best I was
sent.

This has been a strange and exciting project. I am happy that I
started it. I am also really happy with the very simple website
that I have built for it ( https://hearthstories.org ). The
website has a small page for issue one now, showing the cover
art and the list of stories/authors (with links to their
websites). Not too much else of note for readers yet (other than
a page titled "neighbors" that is linked to in the footer. It
has links to other magazines that are in a similar vein).

Since I had posted about this before and some folks seemed
interested, I figured a follow-up would be good. I'll probably
write more on the subject around the time of the issue release.
Feel free to get in touch if you have any questions or comments
(there is a contact page on the website, but you can also hit
me up at sloum AT rawtext.club).