Twelfth Planet Press Numbers
Numbers for Shiny Submissions:
2008
129 Submissions
64 Female
61 Male
4 Unknown
Of these, we bought 5 by female writers and 1 by a male writer and as of this date, 9 remain unprocessed.
2007
198 Submissions
94 Female
94 Male
10 unknown
Of these, we bought 7 by female writers and 2 by male (in this case same author)
In 2007, the editors of Shiny were me, Tansy and Ben. And we bought the stories that we thought were the best in the slush pile. We actually never fought about any and we didn't consider gender at any point.
Issue 1 - 66% female, 66% local content
Issue 2 - 66% female, 66% local content
Issue 3 - 100% female, 0% local content
In 2008, the editorial board changed, Tansy left early and I don't think had much to do with the buying of stories. Ben and I worked on it for a while, then Tehani came on board and then Ben left. I can't remember at which issue it became 100% female - editing of Issue 4 definitely but Ben might have helped choose some of those stories. I think Issue 5 is the first that is definitely 100% female editorship in terms of stories bought and edited.
Issue 4 - 66% female, 33% local content
Issue 5 - 100% female, 66% local content (and will be released in 2009)
Again, we only bought the stories that we thought were the best in the slushpile and never considered gender at any point.
Of note, Trent Jamieson's story "Cracks" has been reprinted in the local Year's Best (Volume 4) and is nominated for an Aurealis Award for Best Young Adult Short Fiction. Sue Isle's story "The Sun People" won a Tin Duck for Best WA Short Story.
I'm not sure what can be concluded from these results or whether they are relevant to the discussion since we have already noted that Young Adult is a female-heavy genre. I suppose what is of interest is that we have about parity at submission stage and which could be taken to mean that women are writing better young adult short stories, at least what we see at Shiny. And to be honest, for me, that is very much true. (And for some reason reminds me of the giant penis slush-story-from-hell as offer of evidence. Heh, I made Ben and Tansy read it just so I wasn't the only one who had. And I still feel a little bit sick)
I offer the following numbers by way of balance, though I feel they are not worth very much as they are probably not statistically significant.
For the Twelfth Planet Press Novella series:
2008
21 Submissions
18 Male
3 Female
And I have bought 3 in total, all by male writers. And two remain unprocessed. In this case, women have not been submitting and one of these was not in line with submission guidelines as it was a full length novel.
Draw from these numbers what you will. Are my anthology stats of interest?
2008
129 Submissions
64 Female
61 Male
4 Unknown
Of these, we bought 5 by female writers and 1 by a male writer and as of this date, 9 remain unprocessed.
2007
198 Submissions
94 Female
94 Male
10 unknown
Of these, we bought 7 by female writers and 2 by male (in this case same author)
In 2007, the editors of Shiny were me, Tansy and Ben. And we bought the stories that we thought were the best in the slush pile. We actually never fought about any and we didn't consider gender at any point.
Issue 1 - 66% female, 66% local content
Issue 2 - 66% female, 66% local content
Issue 3 - 100% female, 0% local content
In 2008, the editorial board changed, Tansy left early and I don't think had much to do with the buying of stories. Ben and I worked on it for a while, then Tehani came on board and then Ben left. I can't remember at which issue it became 100% female - editing of Issue 4 definitely but Ben might have helped choose some of those stories. I think Issue 5 is the first that is definitely 100% female editorship in terms of stories bought and edited.
Issue 4 - 66% female, 33% local content
Issue 5 - 100% female, 66% local content (and will be released in 2009)
Again, we only bought the stories that we thought were the best in the slushpile and never considered gender at any point.
Of note, Trent Jamieson's story "Cracks" has been reprinted in the local Year's Best (Volume 4) and is nominated for an Aurealis Award for Best Young Adult Short Fiction. Sue Isle's story "The Sun People" won a Tin Duck for Best WA Short Story.
I'm not sure what can be concluded from these results or whether they are relevant to the discussion since we have already noted that Young Adult is a female-heavy genre. I suppose what is of interest is that we have about parity at submission stage and which could be taken to mean that women are writing better young adult short stories, at least what we see at Shiny. And to be honest, for me, that is very much true. (And for some reason reminds me of the giant penis slush-story-from-hell as offer of evidence. Heh, I made Ben and Tansy read it just so I wasn't the only one who had. And I still feel a little bit sick)
I offer the following numbers by way of balance, though I feel they are not worth very much as they are probably not statistically significant.
For the Twelfth Planet Press Novella series:
2008
21 Submissions
18 Male
3 Female
And I have bought 3 in total, all by male writers. And two remain unprocessed. In this case, women have not been submitting and one of these was not in line with submission guidelines as it was a full length novel.
Draw from these numbers what you will. Are my anthology stats of interest?