They're probably looking to claim they "discovered" a certain diamond in the rough type author. And good for them and us!
No kidding! “we’ll take anyone except straight white cis-males with a masters of fine arts” edit: see, with lists those longs I can’t even get it right. “We’ll take anyone except straight white cis-gendered people under 40 with an MFA”. #oddlyspecific
If there isn't a separate thread for this kind of thing, we should make one! Very useful info, especially when the submission window is so small. It doesn't look like they publish genre fiction, so that's too bad for me. Their book list seems to be mostly "literary fiction." Love to see such things though, thanks for sharing it !
yeah I might do. I’m in mixed feelings with this book, it’s not as good as my last, nor my next one. Part of me just wants to get the misery of rejection over and done with but being sensible I want to take it slowly and see what feedback I do get
Oh, dear. How do you live with the shame and degradation of such an academic achievement? You forgot to put in the part about neuronormal. (The perk of being "neurodivergent" is I get to make jokes about it without all the woke neuronormals chastizing me for it, so don't bother.) TinHouse is located in Portland, Oregon. They also offer retreats. Long ago, I got to be writer is residence at a national monument and it was a fine experience that I'd be happy to repeat. If I did get to do an artist/writer retreat, I'd prefer it to not be in a teeming metropolis.
I expect that the Tin House slush pile has a much higher concentration of people with MFAs the general population. Yep! Everybody loves an underdog.
Do you seriously think a poorly written novel by a person falling into an "under-represented group" would be accepted over a well-written novel produced by anyone, under-represented or not? Publishers have to sell books in order to stay afloat. They take what they think will sell. What will sell is not always determined by quality of writing but rather by giving the public the stories they want to read.
Not if it's complete shit, but submission criteria is there as the first filter, so to only consider work if the author 'belongs' to specific group or not (which is itself discriminatory logic as we are all our own selves) by it's very nature makes quality a secondary consideration. Obviously publishers accepting or prioritising female writers will not consider a male writer no matter how good the work may or may not be--the reverse of the prejudice historically faced by female writers who could only get their work looked at when they used a male pseudonym. So yes, work of lower quality might be chosen depending on the diversity criteria or prejudices of the publisher. It is, in it's own way, a marketing strategy aimed at making more sales, which is why they often heavily publicise the author's 'diversity' over the content (at least from what I've seen).
Yes. Publishing (and writing) don't exist in a vacuum. Do you seriously think a vice-president/White House press secretary/Supreme Court justice who fall into an under-represented group would be, by definition, better at those jobs than anyone from a different group?
I do think in the wake of the George Floyd protests, there was such a big push to promote diversity that it really became self-defeating for everyone, in a sense. Many authors from traditionally underrepresented groups are tired of having to discuss their identities rather than their work. (For example, I read an interview recently with Brian Taylor where he said if you want to know what it is like to be Black and gay, go read James Baldwin). Authors from overrepresented or just plain represented groups felt like they were excluded from consideration. It was hard to find a cis-gender white male author published in a top literary magazine, on the faculty of a top writers conference, on the short list of a major literary award, etc. However, I've noticed in the last six months or so, that the authors in the top literary magazines, at least, have returned to being a truly diverse and representative mix where the interest of the story is more important than the identity of the author.
Let's not get too caught up in a discussion about the merits and failings of diversity criteria. That smells like a separate topic for the debate room.
You started it. One of the side effects of cherry picking is it becomes easy to assume one writer's work was chosen over another's because the first writer fit into some kind of criteria. Fifty years ago, I was one of the first women to work in my field and I lost track of the times someone accused me of getting the job because of my gender instead of my qualifications for the job. When querying, I avoid agents who state they're looking for clients with specific backgrounds, even if my work fits their criteria otherwise. I'd rather know about their preferences up front than waste my time submitting work to someone who has a specific agenda.
In a novel I was reading recently, the bad guy points his gun at the good guy and says, "Nothing personal. Just a job I was hired to do." The good guy says, "But it's personal to me!" Then the good guy disarms the bad guy and points the gun at him. "Nothing personal, just a job I do to clean up the gene pool..." BOOM! Okay, so how is that relevant to rejections? They're personal. We spend months, sometimes years, investing ourselves in our characters, their problems and how they're going to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. The rational part of our brains knows the characters and the plot are fiction. We're making this stuff up. In the imaginary part of our brains, the characters and their difficulties are real. This stuff is really happening. It's personal. Personal? How can that be? Walt Whitman reminds us that, "There is no trick or cunning, no art or recipe to have in your writing what you do not have in yourself. Nor can you keep whatever evil or shallowness you entertain in yourself out of your writing." Rejections are personal. But that doesn't mean we should be angry or judgmental when an agent aims a rejection at us and says, "Nothing personal. It's just a job I was hired to do."
Just because they are encouraging writers from these groups to submit doesn't mean any of them will be published or will be published over other groups of people who don't tick these boxes. This is Tin House. They are not going to skimp on quality. I think it's a good thing that they want to hear from more voices. Good writing can come from anywhere, and Tin House is just publicly stating that they are open to receiving work from everyone. There is no filter to only look at these submissions first. I don't know what Tin House does, but a lot of publications that put out similar calls for diversity don't even read the cover letters until actually looking at the writing. The truth of the matter is that there are underrepresented groups in publishing, and that is a problem. These invites for other groups to submit is little more if anything than just encouraging these writers to put there were out there and see what happens. So what if Tin House lists these groups and wants to see work form them. Tin House isn't going to lower its standards in the name of diversity, but maybe there are works that are not getting the proper attention or are being passed over or the writers feel like there are already too many strikes against them. I believe the work will be evaluated at the same standards as any other submission, and I probably something from one of these underrepresented groups might be just as good if not better than the privileged, white man with an MFA now trying to sell his third book. I mean Tin House says you're in an underrepresented group if you've never published a book and you're over 40. I think they've done a lot to include writers of all kinds. And, of course, they're not stopping anyone from submitting. Some people may just need to hear, "Hey, we're going to take you and your work seriously regardless of who you are." I see this as a good thing.
It's never been hard to find cis-gender, white men published in the top literary journals or winning awards. Never!
Some more rejections coming in from the recent spree. A 3-day and a 4-day agent form rejection. But. I also got a 78-day agent rejection! Seems like some of these older submissions aren't totally dead after all 2023 rejection total: 6
11 days rejection from Book Wyrm Literary Agency (not her style right now) 4 days rejection (decent feedback) from Chase Literary Agency 4 days rejection from Triada Literary Agency (very brief)
