Slush Reading, Seuss Style
Slush I Read
by Jim C. Hines
(Apologies to Seuss)
I read slush.
Slush I read.
That slush I read.
That slush I read!
I do not like that slush I read.
Do you like fanfic with vamps?
I do not like them Mary Sue.
Why do these vamps all worship you?
Here’s a tale from D & D!
I do not want your D & D.
I do not like your elf PC.
I can not stand your purple prose.
I want to punch you in the nose!
Would you like a hot sex scene?
I wrote it for my online ‘zine!
I do not like your pervy tale.
Your metaphors make readers pale.
Your paragraphs are pages long.
Your bad sex scene is oh so wrong!
Can people do that with their lips???
I do not like your manuscripts.
This one is in Comic Sans!
My parents are my biggest fans.
That evil font we do not want!
My aching eyes, my weary sighs.
Why can’t you get the format right?
We post our guidelines in plain sight!
I will not read your 8-point type.
I want to bash you with a pipe!
Would you read this in the loo?
Let me slide it right to you!
I would not, could not, while I poo!
You just hate me ’cause I’m new!
I’m too original for you!
Too original you say?
This book is one absurd cliché!
It should not see the light of day.
I do not like your Mary Sues.
I do not like your crackhead muse.
Eve and Adam, Star Trek slash,
Tolkien ripoffs, pointless trash,
Prologues forty pages long,
Spelling every third word wrong.
I do not want to read this slush.
It’s all too much, my brain is mush!
Just one more story for today.
Soon I’ll clear this slush away.
No more vampires, I pray.
Wait–
This cover letter’s brief.
The format’s clean. What a relief!
Say!
This story from the slush.
This story gives me such a rush.
These pages have a brilliant hook.
I want to read it in a book!
The wordcraft makes me start to swoon.
Is that the end? It came too soon!
I read it one time, two times, three!
It is so good, so good you see!
So I will read the slush again.
And wade through drafts by Twilight fen.
And I will read the pointless plots,
And tales of busty blonde sexbots.
And I will read your pissed off mail.
And I will read it without fail.
Yes I will read slush by the bale
So I can find that next great tale.
Derek
September 23, 2009 @ 9:45 am
HAHAHA! Brilliant.
Chris Billett
September 23, 2009 @ 10:01 am
Absolutely God damn fucking brilliant. When I am king I will make people read this (I’ll just have it written on the wall).
Rissa
September 23, 2009 @ 11:37 am
Must send to everyone I know. So freakin’ hilarious! Thank you.
Ian
September 23, 2009 @ 12:22 pm
“I do not like your crackhead muse.”
That had me laughing so hard I had to close my office door.
Mojo
September 23, 2009 @ 12:24 pm
Absolutely brilliant.
Angel
September 23, 2009 @ 12:33 pm
That was great! I’ll pass it along too. I know people who will get a kick out of it.
N. K. Jemisin
September 23, 2009 @ 12:34 pm
I love you. Are you married? OK if so, I’ll settle for having your babies, with your spouse’s permission of course. Unless you guys swing poly, in which case the marriage proposal still stands. Just gotta cover all the bases.
Holy crap this is funny — side-splittingly so. A thing of beauty. =)
David B. Coe
September 23, 2009 @ 1:12 pm
This is brilliant, Jim. Thanks for sharing!
Jim C. Hines
September 23, 2009 @ 2:13 pm
Married and monogamous, with two kids … which is already more than I can handle some days. But I appreciate the thought 🙂 Thanks!
Chris Billett
September 23, 2009 @ 2:15 pm
You’re supposed to get the snip and then constantly just shrug: “we’ll have to keep trying!”
(Of course, you can also be faithful to your wife. Ok.)
Once again – hilarious. The hat is off to you, sir. It has been all day.
Erin
September 23, 2009 @ 2:29 pm
Haha. That’s absolutely amazing.
Elizabeth Moon
September 23, 2009 @ 2:49 pm
Brilliant! Just…brilliant!
Kelly McCullough
September 23, 2009 @ 3:51 pm
Nicely done, sir! Very nicely done.
Kat Howard
September 23, 2009 @ 5:01 pm
This rocks! (I would love it even if I didn’t have such a soft spot for Seuss that I named my dog Sam I Am)
Kat Richardson
September 23, 2009 @ 9:18 pm
Brilliant, marvelous! Author, author!
Daryl Gregory
September 23, 2009 @ 9:26 pm
I smell extensive linkage and email forwarding. Congratulations.
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September 23, 2009 @ 10:56 pm
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Elle Blum
September 24, 2009 @ 12:54 am
This is awesome. So much fun to read and absolutely hilarious. Thank you so much for writing this.
otrame
September 24, 2009 @ 1:10 am
What an inventive exposition on Sturgeon’s Law!
S.J. Hamrick
September 26, 2009 @ 12:06 am
I laughed out loud as I read this. It amazes me, the crap that people write and think that it’s wonderful and that every publisher would want it. And even more, the junk that actually gets published! (*cough*Twilight*cough)
Jim C. Hines
September 26, 2009 @ 8:23 am
I wince to think about some of the early stories I submitted, 10+ years ago. I’m very grateful most of those never saw print 🙂
Marisa Birns
October 2, 2009 @ 11:40 am
This one is in Comic Sans!
My parents are my biggest fans.
Poor Comic Sans. If you have the time or interest, this is what Comic Sans has to do http://bit.ly/nGBMJ
Great post! Thanks.
Jim C. Hines
October 3, 2009 @ 9:30 am
That was cute – thanks!
Karen
October 8, 2009 @ 11:48 pm
Wow…takes me back to my slush reading days at The Leading Edge at BYU. We didn’t find much worth publishing, but I did meet my future husband there!
Jim C. Hines
October 9, 2009 @ 12:10 pm
When were you slush reading there? I collected a few rejections from Leading Edge when I was working on short fiction 🙂
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October 9, 2009 @ 6:12 pm
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