While many Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror magazine
and book publishers respond to submissions in a timely manner, many
don't; and sometimes their response times are at odds with those stated
in their guidelines.
Which is to say, when writers submit a manuscript to an editor, they
often feel like they've launched it toward a black hole.
These pages are an attempt to locate verifiable response time
data as well as "horror stories" for markets that have kept (or are keeping)
manuscripts far longer than one might consider reasonable.
(Credit the idea to
Sharon Lee, former President of
SFWA.)
Authors are encouraged to drop by to get a handle on
how long to expect a manuscript will be at a given market (and, perhaps,
get a sense of when to query).
There is also some hope that this public knowledge
will encourage editors to speed up their responsiveness, or at least
alter their guidelines to match their reality.
Authors are also asked -- nay, begged -- to
report
their own response times. This helps everyone.
(Note that only paying markets are tracked.)
Remember, you may have to reload this page if you've already looked at it.
(Last update: Thu May 18 22:57:01 MDT 2023. Data range from 6/1/2007 to present.)
Click name of market for raw data
and
discussion forums
specific to each market.
Please report problems to Andrew Burt (former VP of SFWA).
![[Black hole in NGC4261]](http://www.critters.org/blackholes/ngc4261.gif)
discussion forums
specific to each market.