Check out Editorial Anonymous, a blog by a children’s book editor. She gives advice about submitting and occasionally just bitches about her slush pile. There is one post in which she and other editors talk about the strange things that have been found in their slush pile and another in which she explains what a 15,000 manuscript slush pile would look like in your kitchen. Thank you Jamie for giving me the heads-up!
A slush pile, for those who are new to publishing, is the pile of unsolicited manuscripts that publishers receive. When I was interning at Milkweed, the slush pile was in a back room area. Interns wrote the date on which the manuscripts were received in large permanent marker and the manuscripts were reviewed basically in that order. (Solicited/agented manuscripts took precedence.) Interns were encouraged to read and comment on the manuscripts for the editors. As I recall, there was a form for intern comments. Milkweed also had a reader come in to initially review their middle-grade novel submissions.
Milkweed’s current guidelines say they do our best to respond to submissions within six months of receipt. I just talked to an editor at Marshall Cavendish who also said they were six months out on responses.
Any thoughts about piles of slush or wait times?
