Hi, this is the best article I found in Substack about this subject. I cited and recommend it in a new article about the same topic, but with another approach, and in Spanish. It is here:
Hi, this is the best article I found in Substack about this subject. I cited and recommend it in a new article about the same topic, but with another approach, and in Spanish. It is here:
Do you really have to include your mailing address (and phone number) in a cover letter? I can understand how that was a thing in the days of mailed-in submissions, but why would a reader / editor need to know my exact home address in the online submission age?
the following are some of my successful cover letters and bios. it was a fun exercise to read through them and see what has changed as i've become more experienced at submitting.
Stoneboat Literary Journal (an almost identical one also worked for Saw Palm)
Dear Stoneboat readers,
I’m pleased to submit my poems for your consideration. These are simultaneous submissions and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw them immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Kindest Regards,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil (any pronouns) is a heretofore unpublished student writer and a lifelong reader of all kinds. They and their writing very much live in Miami, Florida, for now.
OxMag
Dear readers,
I’m pleased to submit my short story for your consideration. It is a simultaneous submission and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw it immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Kindest Regards,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil (any pronouns) is a student writer and a lifelong reader of all kinds. They and their writing very much live in Miami, Florida, for now.
Astrolabe
Dear Astrolabe editors,
I’m pleased to submit my short stories (“O’Gallivan on the Mountain” and "And Cherubic Cupid, Too") for your consideration. These are simultaneous submissions and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw them immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil is a student and writer whose work can be found in Stoneboat Literary Journal, OxMag, and South Florida Poetry Journal. They live in Miami with the alligators and strangler figs and you can find them at thesuncomingout.substack.com or on Instagram and Twitter @thesuncomingout.
Alocasia
Dear Sarah Clark,
I’m pleased to submit my short story “Mentha" for your consideration. It is heretofore unpublished.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil is a student and writer whose work can be found in Stoneboat, OxMag, Astrolabe, and elsewhere. They live in Miami with the alligators and strangler figs and you can find them on Instagram and Twitter @thesuncomingout.
Heya, I hope I am not too late with asking a question. When writing a coverletter, is it in the body of the e-mail, or in a seperate attachment? (Asking cos‘ in the country I live in, seperate attachment cover letters for job applications are standard. I wonder how that is for (USA) lit mags).
One thing: I have been writing for a loooongg time, but only recently had the urge to publish my work (second half of 2023). So far, I've had two pieces published, both CNF, in small magazines. When I say small, I mean, mags that refuse to step up and buy a subscription to the platforms where they house their websites, (pisses me off because I am struggling to get recognized, and I fucking pay for mine— and it's not that cheap). They also have been publishing for less than two years.
The work in these mags is not bad, but I wonder if they look too fly-by-night to cite as places where I have been published. I know that in the art world better not to exhibit at all than in a gallery with zero prestige, so... should I include these in my cover letter? They're the only ones I have so far, which also enrages me. (I seem to be making it past the first gauntlet of MS readers though, so that's something.)
Question time! If I haven't been published yet, but my work has been accepted for publication, should I or should I not include that in my author bio? Like so: "Her work is slated to appear in Best Magazine Ever."
Hi, really enjoyed reading this. Just wanted to ask - if a journal says it wants to prioritise underrepresented writers, and you’re in one of those categories, where would you put the info - cover letter or bio?
If they prioritize it, I would, yes. If it's an eligibility requirement, it's assumed. But yes, I think this is why you'll often see those marked in folks' bios. But if you want to leave it out of the bio, you could likely kick off the cover letter with a note.
I've read a lot of cover letters, as I read for a lit mag. Apart from the obnoxious ones where the person says something rude, or super long ones where they describe how to get to their grandma's house, they don't matter. I've seen great covers for stories that didn't make the cut, and strange or incoherent covers where the editor's name was wrong for stories that did. One thing I do like to see as a reader is readers being acknowledged. Like, "Dear Readers and Editors." These may be the same people, or there may be slush pile readers and editors... When I submit, I don't like to name editors, because they change. The only time I will name someone is when it's a contest and I know the judge's name, then it's readers+editors+judge. If the story has something specific, like a real-life news item or lived experience that influenced/informed it, I include that sometimes. (I published a flash piece that was inspired by an unfortunate real event where 18,000 cows died in a fire, for example. So I included that in the cover letter.) I also write with "wrong" English on purpose sometimes, so I'll mention that in the cover letter, just as a heads up (I worry they will think I forgot to spell check.) So anything like that, I'd flag in the cover letter. Not what the story is about, but anything that informed the story or about the writing style that can be misunderstood at first glance. Content warnings are nice, but not for me the reader to watch out, but for me the reader to see what the person thinks is worth warning about (tells me more about the author). I like to include my gratitude for anyone taking any time to read my pages. I feel like some of this (what I'm saying here and what others have said/written on the subject, and how it "works") is gatekeeping, like "do these things to prove to us you know what you're doing." So I think all of this can go out the window. Two rules for cover letter: Just don't be rude. And don't lie. Two rules for bio: Be brief. And don't lie.
I like to put content warnings but am no good with really understanding what needs them and what doesn't. One thing that has thrown me off is if I write a poem that for me didn't fall into a content area, but after reading it think, well, maybe someone could interpret it this way...knowing if I should put a content warning or not. I don't want them to see something that may not be there or they may not otherwise have taken from the piece, (ie direct their interpretation), but I also don't want to not warn about something that might be obvious to others even if its not the interpretation that I intended or would see without scrutiny.
Running it by readers doesn't seem to help because it doesn't seem consistent that they will see the same thing, except that they will influence each other - or my, do you think it comes across this way that I didn't intend - after the fact.
I want to make sure I'm compliant and respectful, but also not sure if I am doing it how the mag wants. I'm pretty sure I've given some strange content warnings like "potential violence against worms" that might have made a few heads shake.
I've had that thought about naming editors and usually don't unless I know for sure. Interesting take on trigger warnings. I think I agree. It's tricky. I'm not looking to offend anyone but you step out the door or open your phone and who knows what you'll be faced with. I do get people wanting the right to protect themselves. I just don't know if we as writers always know, beyond the big ones, what will offend readers.
Agreed. Who knows what's a trigger for me? We contain multitudes, and this applies to our traumas, triggers, dislikes, as well. If someone's going through a very hard divorce, a story about divorce may not sit well, may in fact be very upsetting. But, like you said, I understand that others want to protect themselves.
When I was on ugh I used to share a regular set of "River Writes Terrible Bios" in which I copied and pasted someone of my bios for all the world to see my panicked shame. Bios are **hard**. And like I knew they were kind of stressful, but one day my kids looked at my bio from my first publication and said, "oh my god, you have to write a better bio." and then compared it to everyone else's. I was summarily roasted.
My bio was one sentence. It said I like to write. Or that I'm from the US. One of those two.
Meh, ok.
But it happened to be sandwiched between two days of reading the guidelines of two mags that were absolutely vicious about bios. Snarky, judgemental, rude. Then I sat and had to re-evaluate my life. My bios were...an affront.
Inopportune time for a typo. Sorry, the title is meant to be a joke. As in, these sorts of topics are often introduced with titles telling people how to write exceptional cover letters, or the perfect cover letters, but by using language to make it sound a bit dumb and silly I'm highlighting how silly cover letters are. In retrospect, maybe the title was not the ideal place for a joke. Though, if you read these lessons and notice the great amount of care and research I've put into them, I assumed folks would catch on that it was an intentional phrasing.
While the information he presented was interesting (Lits that actually like cover letters), it adds to the work of submitting which I struggle over anyway just “selecting” the poems that I think fit, thus increasing the cramp in my neck when I finally hit send. However, if the Lit asks for a little more info, I’ll do it because I’m a “follow directions” freak.
I totally agree. After spending so much time on everything else, trying to find these small things is frustrating. For me, I sometimes wind up not submitting to lit mags with lots of requests for a cover letter because there are so many great mags, it ends up not being worth my time.
This question is probably better for one of the threads below, but I get confused sometimes about where to post in the longer threads. Re: bios, if you have "many" publications but no books, how many mags would you list? And how do anthology citings stack up against mags?
Ah no worries. Mark has some good thoughts on it in the threads below. I would think not necessarily about what an editor might want to see, but what might instigate a reader to explore more of your work. If you had something fun and interesting about you that you wanted to share, I'd take that over an extra couple lit mags listed. I usually stick to 3-4. But try to think of it that way. A classified to invite readers to learn more about you an your work, rather than only considering the credentials. I think an anthology mention is nice as well. I've seen it noted in bios before, usually for latest works but if it's one you're proud of, throw it in. Feel free to share it here and I can comment my thoughts if you'd like
I like the "fun and interesting" idea. When I look at actual anthology dates, the only 2 I can claim to be near recent are Flash Nonfiction Funny (piece first pubbed in Eclectica) and Into Sanity (first pubbed in Talking Writing as a finalist for a contest.) The other pubs they might be sharing space with in my bio are Brevity Blog, The Writer, Cleaver, Prime Number Magazine, The Offing, Sweet Lit. Thanks for your response above and any input here!
If I have a very anemic social media presence, is it better not to include links to those accounts in a cover letter? I rarely post anything; I use most platforms to follow other people or stalk my kids. Not as creepy as it sounds (hopefully).
hahaha no not creepy. My mom does it to me all the time. Do you have a place you generally share or list where you've published? Shel, my partner, is planning to do a mini-course about turning your instagram into a landing page. Kinda like, set it and forget it. I'll announce that when it's happening but in the meantime, if someone were to ask where they could go to read more of your work, where would you send them?
That mini-course would be awesome! Honestly I would probably send them to my LinkedIn page even though it's more of my journalism work vs essays I've published. Is LinkedIn lame?
I agree about the course! I am currently struggling with the issue of where to send people for my work. And if I had a website, would I list all my published pieces? But also, seeing all my work laid out like that in one place feels so, well, like I need to go lay down about it. I've published stuff in the past because I hyped myself up to submit it, then been thrilled to be accepted, and then thought, holy shit, what have I done? Further, one of the "worst" pieces has appeared twice, once in an anthology. I can't seem to stop myself haha.
Hi, this is the best article I found in Substack about this subject. I cited and recommend it in a new article about the same topic, but with another approach, and in Spanish. It is here:
https://carreras.substack.com/p/hacer-una-carta-de-presentacion-laboral?sd=pf
Hi, this is the best article I found in Substack about this subject. I cited and recommend it in a new article about the same topic, but with another approach, and in Spanish. It is here:
https://carreras.substack.com/p/hacer-una-carta-de-presentacion-laboral?sd=pf
Do you really have to include your mailing address (and phone number) in a cover letter? I can understand how that was a thing in the days of mailed-in submissions, but why would a reader / editor need to know my exact home address in the online submission age?
the following are some of my successful cover letters and bios. it was a fun exercise to read through them and see what has changed as i've become more experienced at submitting.
Stoneboat Literary Journal (an almost identical one also worked for Saw Palm)
Dear Stoneboat readers,
I’m pleased to submit my poems for your consideration. These are simultaneous submissions and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw them immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Kindest Regards,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil (any pronouns) is a heretofore unpublished student writer and a lifelong reader of all kinds. They and their writing very much live in Miami, Florida, for now.
OxMag
Dear readers,
I’m pleased to submit my short story for your consideration. It is a simultaneous submission and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw it immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Kindest Regards,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil (any pronouns) is a student writer and a lifelong reader of all kinds. They and their writing very much live in Miami, Florida, for now.
Astrolabe
Dear Astrolabe editors,
I’m pleased to submit my short stories (“O’Gallivan on the Mountain” and "And Cherubic Cupid, Too") for your consideration. These are simultaneous submissions and, if accepted elsewhere, I will withdraw them immediately.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil is a student and writer whose work can be found in Stoneboat Literary Journal, OxMag, and South Florida Poetry Journal. They live in Miami with the alligators and strangler figs and you can find them at thesuncomingout.substack.com or on Instagram and Twitter @thesuncomingout.
Alocasia
Dear Sarah Clark,
I’m pleased to submit my short story “Mentha" for your consideration. It is heretofore unpublished.
Thank you for your time. I’m honored to have eyes on my work and I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
Marina Ramil
Marina Ramil is a student and writer whose work can be found in Stoneboat, OxMag, Astrolabe, and elsewhere. They live in Miami with the alligators and strangler figs and you can find them on Instagram and Twitter @thesuncomingout.
Heya, I hope I am not too late with asking a question. When writing a coverletter, is it in the body of the e-mail, or in a seperate attachment? (Asking cos‘ in the country I live in, seperate attachment cover letters for job applications are standard. I wonder how that is for (USA) lit mags).
Dear Benjamin,
No real comment other than, thanks for taking the time to do all this, it's super helpful.
Really appreciate all the hard work!
Thank you
One thing: I have been writing for a loooongg time, but only recently had the urge to publish my work (second half of 2023). So far, I've had two pieces published, both CNF, in small magazines. When I say small, I mean, mags that refuse to step up and buy a subscription to the platforms where they house their websites, (pisses me off because I am struggling to get recognized, and I fucking pay for mine— and it's not that cheap). They also have been publishing for less than two years.
The work in these mags is not bad, but I wonder if they look too fly-by-night to cite as places where I have been published. I know that in the art world better not to exhibit at all than in a gallery with zero prestige, so... should I include these in my cover letter? They're the only ones I have so far, which also enrages me. (I seem to be making it past the first gauntlet of MS readers though, so that's something.)
Thanks!
Dear Ben, I am going to read all this on the road. ( am not driving ) Thanks so much! You ROCK!
Sincerely,
Susan Delgado Watts
Yay! Happy to hear it. Enjoy the road
Question time! If I haven't been published yet, but my work has been accepted for publication, should I or should I not include that in my author bio? Like so: "Her work is slated to appear in Best Magazine Ever."
"Forthcoming" is the word I see often, if that's any help.
Haha yes, that's exactly what I'd put. That or some variation.
Hi, really enjoyed reading this. Just wanted to ask - if a journal says it wants to prioritise underrepresented writers, and you’re in one of those categories, where would you put the info - cover letter or bio?
If they prioritize it, I would, yes. If it's an eligibility requirement, it's assumed. But yes, I think this is why you'll often see those marked in folks' bios. But if you want to leave it out of the bio, you could likely kick off the cover letter with a note.
Thanks, that’s very helpful.
I've read a lot of cover letters, as I read for a lit mag. Apart from the obnoxious ones where the person says something rude, or super long ones where they describe how to get to their grandma's house, they don't matter. I've seen great covers for stories that didn't make the cut, and strange or incoherent covers where the editor's name was wrong for stories that did. One thing I do like to see as a reader is readers being acknowledged. Like, "Dear Readers and Editors." These may be the same people, or there may be slush pile readers and editors... When I submit, I don't like to name editors, because they change. The only time I will name someone is when it's a contest and I know the judge's name, then it's readers+editors+judge. If the story has something specific, like a real-life news item or lived experience that influenced/informed it, I include that sometimes. (I published a flash piece that was inspired by an unfortunate real event where 18,000 cows died in a fire, for example. So I included that in the cover letter.) I also write with "wrong" English on purpose sometimes, so I'll mention that in the cover letter, just as a heads up (I worry they will think I forgot to spell check.) So anything like that, I'd flag in the cover letter. Not what the story is about, but anything that informed the story or about the writing style that can be misunderstood at first glance. Content warnings are nice, but not for me the reader to watch out, but for me the reader to see what the person thinks is worth warning about (tells me more about the author). I like to include my gratitude for anyone taking any time to read my pages. I feel like some of this (what I'm saying here and what others have said/written on the subject, and how it "works") is gatekeeping, like "do these things to prove to us you know what you're doing." So I think all of this can go out the window. Two rules for cover letter: Just don't be rude. And don't lie. Two rules for bio: Be brief. And don't lie.
I like to put content warnings but am no good with really understanding what needs them and what doesn't. One thing that has thrown me off is if I write a poem that for me didn't fall into a content area, but after reading it think, well, maybe someone could interpret it this way...knowing if I should put a content warning or not. I don't want them to see something that may not be there or they may not otherwise have taken from the piece, (ie direct their interpretation), but I also don't want to not warn about something that might be obvious to others even if its not the interpretation that I intended or would see without scrutiny.
Running it by readers doesn't seem to help because it doesn't seem consistent that they will see the same thing, except that they will influence each other - or my, do you think it comes across this way that I didn't intend - after the fact.
I want to make sure I'm compliant and respectful, but also not sure if I am doing it how the mag wants. I'm pretty sure I've given some strange content warnings like "potential violence against worms" that might have made a few heads shake.
This is an excellent addition to everything in this lesson. Thank you so much for taking the time to chime in.
I've had that thought about naming editors and usually don't unless I know for sure. Interesting take on trigger warnings. I think I agree. It's tricky. I'm not looking to offend anyone but you step out the door or open your phone and who knows what you'll be faced with. I do get people wanting the right to protect themselves. I just don't know if we as writers always know, beyond the big ones, what will offend readers.
Agreed. Who knows what's a trigger for me? We contain multitudes, and this applies to our traumas, triggers, dislikes, as well. If someone's going through a very hard divorce, a story about divorce may not sit well, may in fact be very upsetting. But, like you said, I understand that others want to protect themselves.
When I was on ugh I used to share a regular set of "River Writes Terrible Bios" in which I copied and pasted someone of my bios for all the world to see my panicked shame. Bios are **hard**. And like I knew they were kind of stressful, but one day my kids looked at my bio from my first publication and said, "oh my god, you have to write a better bio." and then compared it to everyone else's. I was summarily roasted.
My bio was one sentence. It said I like to write. Or that I'm from the US. One of those two.
Meh, ok.
But it happened to be sandwiched between two days of reading the guidelines of two mags that were absolutely vicious about bios. Snarky, judgemental, rude. Then I sat and had to re-evaluate my life. My bios were...an affront.
so, tldr: I miss ugh and bios are hard.
Courtney Maum just did a great lesson on bios, it really helped me out. Highly recommended!
Hahah aw we miss ugh too. Promise, once we finish with optimizations in our code, we will bring it back to life.
I’m sorry, but I can’t get past your headline. Do not consider good grammar to be important?
Inopportune time for a typo. Sorry, the title is meant to be a joke. As in, these sorts of topics are often introduced with titles telling people how to write exceptional cover letters, or the perfect cover letters, but by using language to make it sound a bit dumb and silly I'm highlighting how silly cover letters are. In retrospect, maybe the title was not the ideal place for a joke. Though, if you read these lessons and notice the great amount of care and research I've put into them, I assumed folks would catch on that it was an intentional phrasing.
While the information he presented was interesting (Lits that actually like cover letters), it adds to the work of submitting which I struggle over anyway just “selecting” the poems that I think fit, thus increasing the cramp in my neck when I finally hit send. However, if the Lit asks for a little more info, I’ll do it because I’m a “follow directions” freak.
I totally agree. After spending so much time on everything else, trying to find these small things is frustrating. For me, I sometimes wind up not submitting to lit mags with lots of requests for a cover letter because there are so many great mags, it ends up not being worth my time.
This question is probably better for one of the threads below, but I get confused sometimes about where to post in the longer threads. Re: bios, if you have "many" publications but no books, how many mags would you list? And how do anthology citings stack up against mags?
Ah no worries. Mark has some good thoughts on it in the threads below. I would think not necessarily about what an editor might want to see, but what might instigate a reader to explore more of your work. If you had something fun and interesting about you that you wanted to share, I'd take that over an extra couple lit mags listed. I usually stick to 3-4. But try to think of it that way. A classified to invite readers to learn more about you an your work, rather than only considering the credentials. I think an anthology mention is nice as well. I've seen it noted in bios before, usually for latest works but if it's one you're proud of, throw it in. Feel free to share it here and I can comment my thoughts if you'd like
I like the "fun and interesting" idea. When I look at actual anthology dates, the only 2 I can claim to be near recent are Flash Nonfiction Funny (piece first pubbed in Eclectica) and Into Sanity (first pubbed in Talking Writing as a finalist for a contest.) The other pubs they might be sharing space with in my bio are Brevity Blog, The Writer, Cleaver, Prime Number Magazine, The Offing, Sweet Lit. Thanks for your response above and any input here!
If I have a very anemic social media presence, is it better not to include links to those accounts in a cover letter? I rarely post anything; I use most platforms to follow other people or stalk my kids. Not as creepy as it sounds (hopefully).
hahaha no not creepy. My mom does it to me all the time. Do you have a place you generally share or list where you've published? Shel, my partner, is planning to do a mini-course about turning your instagram into a landing page. Kinda like, set it and forget it. I'll announce that when it's happening but in the meantime, if someone were to ask where they could go to read more of your work, where would you send them?
That mini-course would be awesome! Honestly I would probably send them to my LinkedIn page even though it's more of my journalism work vs essays I've published. Is LinkedIn lame?
I agree about the course! I am currently struggling with the issue of where to send people for my work. And if I had a website, would I list all my published pieces? But also, seeing all my work laid out like that in one place feels so, well, like I need to go lay down about it. I've published stuff in the past because I hyped myself up to submit it, then been thrilled to be accepted, and then thought, holy shit, what have I done? Further, one of the "worst" pieces has appeared twice, once in an anthology. I can't seem to stop myself haha.