I signed up with Writer’s Relief, a literary submission service, this week.
I first heard of Writer’s Relief over ten years ago, from a friend who said the service was totally legit and helped her friend with tons of litmag submissions. Determined to make a go of it on my own, and wary of the service (was it a scam? It sounded too good to be true!) I filed her recommendation for later use.
Fastforward five years: hundreds of litmag submissions later, totally harried by the process, sick of having to research new litmag venues for my work, and having no more room/time for litmag submissions because I’ve prioritized my novel writing above all else, Writer’s Relief began to make sense for me.
I tweeted my discouragement about the litmag submission process–how time consuming, how disappointing, how dismaying…and a friend, that very same friend from ten years ago, tweeted, “Writer’s Relief.” Okay, I thought. And then another friend recommended Writer’s Relief, too. She’d used it because she was a newbie to the litmag submission process–and she recommended them.
So I submitted my work on over to them, and a week or so later, I received a letter in the mail that said they’d take me on as a client (and noted that they really liked the openings of my stories–hey, I’ll take any compliment I can get as a writer). The price isn’t cheap, but I’ve decided to sacrifice on other things for the sake of my writing, again, as part of my crusade to prioritize my writing above all else.
So far, I have found that the folks are great, the process is clearly outlined and very organized…stay tuned for more updates on this service.
Has anyone else used Writer’s Relief? I’m looking forward to working with them.
Update: Writer’s Relief was okay. They didn’t do anything I would have done on my own–I thought perhaps they’d do some research and find literary magazines I hadn’t heard of/might be a better fit for my writing, but it seemed like a pretty generic list of litmags. The cover letter tweaking was nice, but again, not groundbreaking.
It is great for people just starting out with submissions. Or with people who have zero time.
80,000 words 