I am working on a medievel type fantasy novel about magic and am far enough along where I want to see if I can take a small chunk of it and submit it to say, Realms Of Fantasy.... do I need to let them know that it IS in fact an excerpt from an as yet unpublished novel or can I just submit it "as" a short story?
No I think he just wants to see if he is on the right track, if he needs to re-wire it, re-work it, so on, before he goes through with this huge undertaking.. That's just my understanding of it..
Having a part of the work published as a short story might affect the first publication rights, which most publishers want, when it is time to sell the novel. Perhaps you should check with a copyright attorney.
I think it sounds WAY too early to even be bothering looking into publication. You're still working on the longer story, which means it probably hasn't been proofed, checked, revised, edited, beta'ed, polished, or whatever yet. You should definitely wait until the entire thing is done before even bothering with such a thought. That aside, even if you did manage to get the short excerpt published in "ROF," that would then probably lead to issues getting the novel ITSELF published seeing as part of it will have already been put in print--you'd probably have to get permission from "ROF" to get the excerpt printed again with the bigger publisher, if the big publisher didn't have an issue with it since the first rights might have been compromised. I don't understand all the mechanics of it, nor the publishers' guidelines, but that's a lot of if's. I say just keep plugging along on the story and finish it first. Don't put the cart before the horse.
Sorry-- I'll try to be a little clearer of my intent I am working on a fantasy novel about magic I have about 70 pages done including one chapter I would like to sell to a print magazine now as it can be a self contained story in and of itself Next year once the novel is finished and I am shopping it around this chapter will be a part of the novel my question is do I HAVE to tell whoever I am selling the chapter to that it is in fact part of a bigger novel? What if I can sell the story but the novel never sells? What if I cant sell the chapter but the novel sells? The chapter as I said is IN AND OF ITSELF a self contained whole story that can be read on its own without the novel Hope that helps
The only place I would suggest doing what you're cosidering doing is with the Writers of the Future contest, because of the publishing rights issues. I have one of the books they put out of all the winners, and one of the stories was turned into a novel. It was started by L. Ron Hubbard , but don't worry. It has nothing to do with Scientology.
Rei- I checked their website out and it looks like it's exactly what I had in mind. The FAQ/Rules even specify that something may be of a larger work but it must be suvbmited as a seperate work and be able to stand on it's own AS a singlular story which is what my excerpt does next deadline is Dec Thank you for the heads up!
...no, you don't... because it's not part of a published novel yet, only part of a novel-in-progress... ...then at least all your hard work won't have been wasted... ...why would that be a problem?... it'll be as if the short story never existed, is all... you're working up a passel of worries over nothing... even some famous writers have ended up with novels that began as short stories and then were expanded later on... ...there's no need to consult an attorney, since all of the work is your own and you can do whatever you want with it... ...if the short story never sells, it's a non-issue and if it's sold and published, that can only help sell the novel, so where's the downside in any of this?...
For the most part, I agree with mammamaia, however, it seems to me that if you "publish" part of your novel as a short story, then that publisher holds a copyright on that writing. In that case, any other prospective publisher for the entire novel might not be able to include the copyrighted material. Can the rest of your story stand alone without the short story portion?
that's also a non-issue, cog... when a short story is published, the publisher only buys a one-time right [such as 'first north american serial rights], unless the writer is foolish enough to sign away more...
Well, if it comes down to it-- yes, the chunk of story CAN be left out of the novel. I designed it that way. Though it seems mamma has a point about first time rights and if so, the chunk can be included and add to the novel since it's basically a kind of prologue
