A Story for My Mother

I’ve been working on a new short story for almost a year now. I know that sounds like a really long time—and it is—but it also feels like never enough time, because it’s in honor of my mother.

This story hits close to home (literally and figuratively.) The plot is inspired by a tale my mom told me about her childhood in Hyderabad, India. She witnessed the impact of a dam closing, leaving countless dead fish on one side of the river. As I listened to her story, I found myself wondering what happened to all the fish on the other side of the dam—the ones who survived, whose families disappeared. Last year, my mom died. It has been extremely difficult to keep going, but I have been resolved to expand and continue work on this story in honor and tribute to her.

It’s been a long journey. Over the past year, it’s gone through about ten (!) major revisions. The story actually began as a short fable I wrote years ago. That tale was about 500 words, expanded to somewhere around 6,000, and after all the editing has landed in the 3,500 range. It’s come a long way! My editor encouraged me to write a blog post about the process, just given how many changes it has taken on and the directions it has gone in and what I’ve learned. I might do that someday once it’s published.

So, that’s a big win: The story is finally ready!

This week, I submitted the short story to a bunch of literary journals. This is a new process for me; I haven’t submitted short stories for publication before. Usually I would just publish short fables in Quick Brown Fox. I’ve decided to take a different strategy partly because of how fond I’ve become of literary journals. I didn’t really know much about them before and I didn’t really understand their purpose. Why would I go through all this effort to get published when I already have a newsletter and readers, I could just publish my stories directly to you. While that is true, getting published in a literary journal is a different process. You end up editing your story a lot more, you learn a lot along the way.

For me, the biggest change / growth through this process has been reading other writers’ short stories. Some of my favorite journals are Ploughshares, Southern Humanities Review, Ecotone, and Orion.

It takes a bit of time and effort to find the publications that really speak to you, but it’s worth it. I was happily surprised to discover such a big variety of story genre, style, and author backgrounds. Also, literary journals are certainly feeling the heat like all literary publications, but they have not disappeared. And by reading, subscribing, and supporting them, you can help keep this rich tradition of literature alive.

I noticed something about lit mag readers too: They read closely. In a world where everyone is reading less and scrolling more, that is really appealing! I say that both as a writer who wants folks to read my work, as well as a reader that needs more things in my life that let me disconnect, get into the flow, and immerse myself in the beauty of art.

This is just the beginning of my literary journey. I have a lot of rejections ahead of me (this is expected for even the best of stories) before my story might find its home, but I know my work is vastly improved as a result of the process. I hope to share a link of a published story with you someday soon.