Body Parts Magazine

Hi. Although I haven't submitted to that particular magazine (as it's not my genre), I have submitted to literary magazines, looked on Submission Grinder, etc.

Are you new at submitting to magazines? It's normal for magazine editors to take several months to decide on pieces, while new work comes in, and to send rejections or acceptances; it's also normal for some magazines to not accept simultaneous submissions and the wording of those guidelines look like other general, standard magazine submission guidelines to me.

You can browse other magazines on duotrope and Submission Grinder to see for yourself that some--even popular, long-time, award-winning magazines--have these things listed in their guidelines, too. It's not sketchy; it's just that some magazine editors don't want to deal with choosing work, only to find out later on--or without being notified--that it was simultaneously submitted to another publication and already accepted or published. But if you prefer to submit to other ones that allow simultaneous submissions, you can.

Also, it's possible and normal that a few new magazines might not have any stats from writers on Submission Grinder, Duotrope, etc., as not all writers choose to submit their stats on these websites. I don't bother with doing that, myself, and I found another lit mag, run by a university, that doesn't have any stats, either, even though they've already published five issues. So, a lack of stats there, doesn't necessarily mean anything bad or negative is going on; it might be because either the magazine is new, fairly new, or just catering to a small, niche, genre market.

From browsing the internet about Body Parts magazine, they do have a Facebook website with a few hundred followers https://www.facebook.com/bodypartsmagazine/ , a Duotrope listing https://duotrope.com/listing/13128 (on Duotrope's site, they say they regularly email magazine editors and check publications' websites to make sure they're still in existence), and their editor does have a personal website, with her own work, if you're still interested in submitting to the magazine and want to learn more about the people you're submitting to, to determine if they're legitimate.

http://www.kirstenimanikasai.com/

aspirit said:

...I'm not new to submitting. Body Parts is new to me, and the only writer I know who's submitted there has yet to hear back. I'd wondered if they are sending rejection letters that weren't reported on The Grinder. Apparently they don't...

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You're welcome. How long have both of you been waiting? It's not unusual for some magazines to list in their guidelines that it might take 4-6 months, 6-8 months or (for the popular ones), up to a year for them to respond, because they receive thousands of submissions for each issue. Unlike querying agents at agencies, magazines generally send a mass, email response, to let everyone who submitted know whether their work their work was accepted or rejected.

But, if you've waited for several months and the magazine has already published a new issue, they usually say writers can contact them and ask about their submission, whether they're still considering it for publication or not.

...I'm not comfortable with a publisher of their size holding submissions indefinitely unless writers take the additional step to withdraw. Plenty of other publishers are more conscientious of story rights and writers' time.

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That's odd, if they're holding submissions, indefinitely. Usually, magazines mean that they're only asking you to withdraw your work if it's been accepted elsewhere, if they haven't rejected or accepted it, yet (during the few or several months they're reading submissions). Then, before they publish a recent issue, they usually notify everyone who submitted, whether their work has been rejected or accepted (or, if they want to publish their work in a later issue, to let writers know that it'll be a while before it's published).

After that, they usually don't bother to keep or hold everyone's submission(s) they've rejected and aren't interested in publishing.