Thanks for your interest! GreenPrints lives because people like you care about gardening—and about sharing with other gardeners. Without your contributions, the magazine simply would not exist.  So, thank you!

Now, what do I want?

1) The best, personal (important word, that) garden writing I can get. Expressive, thoughtful, humorous, angry, contrite, flippant, searching, witty, observant, sad, inviting— whatever! We focus on the human, not how-to side of gardening. On the people as well as the plants. After all, gardening is a relationship, not a recipe. GreenPrints explores that relationship, not by instructing, preaching, or lecturing about it. Instead, we celebrate it . . . by sharing the stories and experiences we all have trying (and sometimes failing) to get along with plants.

Do you want to know a secret? The thing Pat most wants? That will win him over every time?

A good story.

That’s it. A good, entertaining, clever, moving, funny story. One with, you know, a narrative. A plot. Where something happens—something remarkable, touching, unexpected, hilarious. Let me say it again: a good story. One you’d like to hear or read. Most especially, a true story. Something special that happened to you.

And, please, try to show us the story, not tell us about it. Remember the old high-school English-class dictum: Show, don’t tell. Take us through the experiences with trenchant details and tight descriptions. Don’t say it was profound or funny or beautiful: make us experience the feelings by taking us through them with you.

2) We’re not opposed to essays, but the good ones a) evolve directly from personal experience and b) offer new insights or at least new ways of expressing old insights. We’re not opposed to fiction, either, but don’t you agree that it should offer something special that the nonfiction stories we get don’t (i.e., don’t just imitate reality).

3) One thing for sure, we don’t want sappy, gooey writing. Tender, moving, poignant is wonderful. But syrupy is a big trap GreenPrints has to avoid. (Another is preachy. We can all read lectures and sermons other places, n’est-ce pas?)

4) Strong endings. Many, many, many times I send pieces back to say, “This peters out. The ending is weak, obvious, trite. Give me a creative, witty, forceful conclusion. Stop the piece with a wham, not a whimper.” A good ending (some of which make a clever reference back to the beginning) can lift the whole piece a notch and make it end with an exclamation point of strength, instead of, well . . . just . . .  fading . . . away . . .

5) Length? I don’t know. Since we’re digest-sized, most of our pieces are no more than 2,000 words. But write what you have to. If it’s good, we’ll work out length problems.

6) Payment? Did you have to ask? We pay miserably; top payment is $200 and we often pay less. I apologize. You deserve more. When GreenPrints starts paying me better than miserably, I will be only too glad to pay more. (Right now, I’m working for peanuts.) We pay on acceptance, buy First North American Serial Rights (unless you’ve already published it somewhere else first; we’re happy to reprint pieces—as long as they’re good!).

7) By the way, Call me Gutenburg Stone (or worse), but I really prefer to receive real-mailed, not e-mailed, submissions. E-mailed submissions may be easier for you, but they're harder for me. Sorry. Plus, I write personal replies to all real-mailed submissions. And PLEASE, do include a SASE [SASE = Self-Addressed, Stamped Envelope]. Pretty Please. (Thank you.)

Mail your manuscripts to:

Pat Stone, Ed.
GreenPrints
P.O. Box 1355
Fairview, NC 28730

8) In your cover letter, please tell me something clever/witty/appropriate about yourself that I can use for our “Contributor’s Page” if we use your piece.

9) Poetry: Well, we run about 1 poem per issue. That’s 4 per year, so let’s admit there’s not much chance I can accept your poem. The ones I do take tend to be a) hands-on, dirt-under-the-nails, gardening poems b) not too saccharine, and c) rarely in rhyme, but most of all d) clever. Innovative. Offering well-expressed, detail-dressed new twists on this magazine’s very old topic. Payment: $25.

10) One last thing: Are you a SUBSCRIBER? If not, please—oh, please—consider becoming one: $19.97 a year; $22.97U.S. to Canada. (Makes a great gift, too!) Not only does it get you a wonderful little magazine and the best possible feel for the type of writing we run, it also helps us survive so we can run your writing! Thanks again.

Thanks again. I do appreciate your contribution and the work it takes. Best to you with prose, plants, and life,

            Pat Stone, Editor

P.S. Oh, one more last thing: I generally can't find time to read submissions until the month after an issue deadline. So your submission is likely to lie fallow until late in Feb., May, Aug., or Nov. Sorry.