Cricket Magazine / Cicada

I'm surprised there isn't more discussion here about Cricket/Cicada/Carus/etc.

Their submission guidelines are here. Click on the magazine name to see the specific guidelines.

If you submit to one magazine they might decide it will be better in another. They report paying up to 25 cents per word.

The rights they obtain make me uneasy: For unpublished works "the rights vary," for previously published, they take 2nd North American rights but pay less than for previously unpublished works, and for recurring features (which is what I was hoping to have) they "purchase the material outright," and it becomes property of Carus. This makes me uneasy because if I wanted to do a book of my recurring features it seems I would not be able to.

Any experiences from AWers?

No experience, but that would make me completely uneasy as well. Buying publishing rights is one thing for a magazine and, yes, magazines often ask for the option to include a published piece in a Best Of anthology or somesuch. But I agree with you, it sounds like they want to take a recurring feature whole so that they can have the option of publishing it as a book.

That's disheartening to see. Cricket was one of my favorite magazines as a child.

By all accounts it's still one hell of a publication credit, I just wonder what I'd be able to do with the material once they publish it.

Story accepted but haven't heard from them in 2 months

I got a story accepted in Spider Magazine. I got the email on October 21 and answered back the same day, accepting the terms they outlined.

But I haven't heard from them since. Since this is the first story I've ever managed to sell, I'm not really familiar with the waiting time. Is this normal? Should I send them an email to remind them I exist? They said they wanted to edit the story first and then send me the contract.

I'm just a little unsure and would like some advice.

I was a little confused about the acceptance/contract thing too, because I've always been sent a contract soon after acceptance. However, of course the contract is written by them anyway so it usually locks me in and lets them off the hook if that's what works out best for them. So, it could be their policy is to have you send the reply to their email that says you accept their terms, which you did, and then wait for the formal stuff until it gets closer to the time it will be published. It says below that it may be a year until then...

Also, 25 cents per word?! Tasty! Congrats on snagging that.


http://www.cricketmag.com/32-Submission-Guidelines-for-SPIDER-magazine-for-children-ages-6-9





After Acceptance

• Once the manuscript is edited, it will be kept on file until it is assigned to an issue. Because we work 6-8 months ahead of each issue, it can be a year or more before a manuscript is placed.

I had a story published by Cricket. They sent a minor edit and contract about 8 months later and then another 6 months passed before it was published. With the check I paid the electric bill, bought Frosted Flakes and framed the magazine. ~karen

Thanks! Since they took a year to accept my submission, I thought that would be about how long the rest of the process would be. Just wanted to be sure... I get super paranoid that maybe I didn't write an appropriate response or something...

In my darkest fantasies they send me an email saying "Just kidding!", but that's just be going off the deep end.

Thanks for the response! It's made me feel loads better!

aperson said:

I had a story published by Cricket. They sent a minor edit and contract about 8 months later and then another 6 months passed before it was published. With the check I paid the electric bill, bought Frosted Flakes and framed the magazine. ~karen

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My time frame with cricket was about the same, which was a little slower than most, but that's how sometimes I like having a check coming in down the road. It helps balance my budget.

Jamesaritchie said:

My time frame with cricket was about the same, which was a little slower than most, but that's how sometimes I like having a check coming in down the road. It helps balance my budget.

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Could you tell me exactly how long you had to wait before you got a response to your Cricket submission? I submitted a poem to them via Submittable back at the very beginning of September 2014, and I still haven't gotten a response. It's been over 6 months now, and I was wondering if I should submit again. Does the long wait indicate that my work has made it to the upper echelon for consideration? How long does Cricket usually take when it rejects a piece?

Does anyone know of an email address to query a submission status for Cricket Media? I submitted a short story to Spider Magazine (an imprint of Cricket Media) on 1/3/16. I haven't heard anything from them and my submission has been listed as In Progress on Submittable for almost the entire time. When I tried to query after 180 days, I discovered that they are very difficult to contact. There's no email or point person listed on the website or Submittable page. Though, according to Duotrope, they haven't sent out any notifications since May. Is this normal for them?

HELP?

They certainly make it hard to contact them. There is a vague email address but not sure how helpful it would be and you may have already found/used this [email protected]

Their usual wait time is anywhere from 3-6 months. If accepted, you might be waiting another year to it seeing publication and more time after that for payment. Payment wait times have been up to a year AFTER publication.
They are still constantly swamped with submissions, because it's about the prestige this group of magazines still commands in the kid lit Industry. It's certainly not about the money nor the loss of rights to story, poem or Illustration. They once upon a time offered better terms, with a payment each time the work was used again in various ways but now they own the work and do with it as they like, licensing it to others, no further compensation that I have heard about.
You have obviously waited far longer then 6 months, hope you hear something soon!

ePals Corporation (Canadian) still owns Cricket Media but disolved the Carus Group (which they had acquired a number of years back and which owned Cricket mags among other publications)

Hmm. I submitted a short story to them in February and received a form rejection in March. But I was also submitting to the magazine for older readers, so maybe they have a different turnaround.

zmethos, I imagine they don't get the same massive numbers of submissions as they do from Authors and Illustrators for their baby, toddler and pre K/Elementary aged magazines. That's Cicada?

zmethos said:

Hmm. I submitted a short story to them in February and received a form rejection in March. But I was also submitting to the magazine for older readers, so maybe they have a different turnaround.

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Thanks for responding ctripp and zmethos

When I've submitted to Cicada Magazine in the past, they've been very prompt with a two week to one month rejection. I don't want to get my hopes up that no news is good news about Spider as the last time a publication with a quick response time didn't get back to me I thought I was in for sure. When I finally queried, they apologized. It seems they put my story in the wrong queue on submittable when it should have been rejected. I guess I'll continue to wait :/

ctripp said:

snip
They are still constantly swamped with submissions, because it's about the prestige this group of magazines still commands in the kid lit Industry. It's certainly not about the money nor the loss of rights to story, poem or Illustration. They once upon a time offered better terms, with a payment each time the work was used again in various ways but now they own the work and do with it as they like, licensing it to others, no further compensation that I have heard about.
You have obviously waited far longer then 6 months, hope you hear something soon!

ePals Corporation (Canadian) still owns Cricket Media but disolved the Carus Group (which they had acquired a number of years back and which owned Cricket mags among other publications)

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Are you saying their contract demands ALL rights on submitted work?

'T would be unusual if that were the case.