I’m excited to share the reprint of an essay dear to my heart, “Geraniums” on Short Reads. Short Reads publishes new and previously published flash essays, one a week. You can read “Geraniums” here.

How this happened: I haven’t been submitting much. I subscribe to Short Reads and received an email with the call for reprints. I thought of “Geraniums” and instead of putting this on a list to do later, I submitted immediately. Submitting a reprint doesn’t require reading and perhaps polishing the essay yet again, just providing the link to where it was previously published. Three and a half weeks later “Geraniums” was accepted. 

What happened next: I waited to hear when my piece would be published. Being a reprint, I expected it to be published as is. But Short Reads edits and fact-checks all their pieces, including reprints. I enjoyed working with Hattie Fletcher—her edits, mostly of punctuation, made the piece flow better. From the fact-checking, I learned to be more aware of the quality of my sources. This was a good wake-up call for the book I’m working on about my Armenian grandmother and the genocide she survived.  

Writers: Submissions are currently closed at Short Reads, but if you subscribe, you’ll get an email when they open again. That might be the nudge you need to submit!

Readers: If you enjoy reading short essays, subscribe to get an essay in your inbox once a week.

Thank you for reading! Writing is a lonely endeavor and your presence here brightens my day!