Holden McGroin Steps Up for Writers

Author Robert Swartwood continues his campaign against journals taking advantage of aspiring writers in his latest blog post, "Reminder Redux: Money STILL Flows To The Writer," a follow-up of sorts to a previous post taking the journal Narrative to task for charging $20 to submit a prose manuscript.

In response to the journal's recent call for interns, Swartwood set up a Gmail account under the name "Holden McGroin" and began a correspondence with the editors. A highlight: When the editors respond that "Holden" failed to attach a resume to his previous e-mail, Swartwood replies:

"Dear The Editors,

"I am very sorry about that. I was not aware I had already started something. What would you like me to resume?"

Wonderful.

I agree Narrative has it coming. Yet, unfortunately, even Swartwood must agree it's a person's own fault if they shell out $20 to submit to a journal.

P.S. If anyone wants to pay me $20 to consider their work, feel free to shoot me an e-mail. I, like Narrative, will accept multiple submissions, since I, like Narrative, feel that "it's unreasonable to expect writers to give a magazine an exclusive look at a work unless the magazine can respond within two to three weeks."

I mean the last thing I want -- and I'm sure Narrative must feel the same -- is to be unreasonable.

(The image above is from The Writers' Police Academy, whose motto appears to be "Sweat Now, So Your Manuscript Doesn't Bleed Red Ink Later." Nice.)