I thought I'd share a recent dealing I had with an editor.

I submitted a poem to a new online magazine in late February of this year. The stated response time was three to four weeks. By early April, I had received no response, so I queried about my submission's status by email. The editor wrote me back the following day, telling me she had never received my submission. I resubmitted twenty-four hours later.

I waited seven days, then dropped the editor a note, asking if she'd received my poem without incident, in light of the past problem of lost email. I waited seven more days for an acknowledgment from her. After no answer, I queried a second time. On May 12--twenty days later--I still had heard nothing from her, so I emailed her for the third time.

On July 7, I found a letter from her in my inbox. She did not address me by name or offer salutation of any kind in her email. She said her mother had suffered a stroke in January and passed away in May, so this caused her to fall way behind. It pained me to read this, but I'm not sure what relevance such news had in explaining her non-response to multiple emails. I say this because, interestingly enough, this devastating health issue didn't hinder her in the least in publishing extensive genre-related posts on her blog, at the time that the crisis was transpiring, nor did it keep her from scheduling and presumably participating in chatroom sessions, again, on genre-oriented topics. It's also worth noting that no news update or explanation of any kind about her absence appeared on the magazine's website, during this ordeal.

I'm no stranger to family health problems. My father had a severe stroke in October of last year, teetering as close to death as possible without succumbing. Piling obstacle upon obstacle, he endured surgery, serious infection, and two bouts of pneumonia. He spent four months in the hospital, and is in the recuperative process, as I type these words, and improving every day. I've helped care for him in this trying time, and somehow I manage performing my job and other duties without excuses or disappearances, as if gulped into a black hole. I answer emails, letters, and address whatever business needs attending.

I'm sure you can see the end coming, when I tell you that her curt letter included a nice rejection, in which she told me that I should read up on poetic meter. She also informed me that writing effective rhyming poetry requires more than a rhyming word at the end of every other line. As a past Rhysling nominee and published author of dozens of poems, you can imagine that I was quite chastened and astonished at this incisive observation. She ended the letter with no "Sincerely," or "Best Wishes," etc. Just her name.

Before anyone raises the question, all of my correspondence with her from my end was cordial and pleasant.

I believe her conduct was unprofessional; this is the kind of behavior that gives editors a bad name, in my opinion. If one has time for chatting online and blogging, one has time for firing off a two-sentence response to emails. If one is behind due to health concerns, why not post news on the website to that effect, or have someone else do so or fill-in on a temporary basis?

It is often pointed out how rude and unprofessional some writers are, and rightly so. Unfortunately, some editors fit the same bill.

Wesley Lambert