A short story featuring lost love, murder most foul, and robots. The story sprang almost full-blown into my mind while I was talking with my father about Artificial Intelligence and the singularity.

I haven’t sent it anywhere yet but I will soon…and I’ll track my submissions and rejections here.

Edit: Ok, since last I updated I’ve sent this story to Analog and Asimovs. Both rejections. I cry a little and move on.

Current submission is to Lightspeed. Also rejected.

I’ve since been through Clarkesworld and Daily Science Fiction. Two more rejections.

Today it went to IGMS. Today it came back from IGMS, rejected, but with a note as to why. Thanks, Eric, for taking the time to critique it. I just called Eric and he said that if I manage to fix the “why” he’d like to see it again. I think I know how to do that, so I will be.

I made the corrections, which involved punching up the importance of one of the two arcs and solidifying the ending into something stronger.  Thus improved, I sent it back to Eric and anxiously await a reply.

Got a reply. He wasn’t looking for the kind of fix I implemented, which was a character ending. He was looking for a science ending. I deliberately left that question open though, so I’ll leave it open and send it off again.

Sent it to Redstone SF. Waiting…

No reply from Redstone SF yet. According to their Facebook page they’re finished with the first reading of their latest open submission period.  And since I haven’t heard from them I can only assume they’re still considering it. (Yes, I checked my spam folder.)

Apparently my story made it to the final round of reading and was then rejected. Sigh. This comes after a brutal session of critique at my writing group on another story I’m working on. Difficult to take.

However, I shall submit again and write on.

Bam! The Light Goes Out is off to Shimmer Magazine whose guidelines say they lean toward fantasy with a bit of sadness but will consider Science Fiction as well.  I think TLGO fits the bill. We’ll see if they agree.

Nope. Another rejection, though a very nice one.

And it’s off to Strange Horizons. I’m kind of surprised I hadn’t already sent it there. I hope I really haven’t. I’d hate to be hitting them twice. That’s just embarrassing.

Nope, another rejection.

Haven’t sent it anywhere since. No plans to at this time.