User blog comment:HumboldtLycanthrope/The 666 word pasta write off!/@comment-24101790-20160408002601/@comment-26475800-20160408172644

I do like to challenge myself when it comes to writing. At the moment, with my real stories, I am working on getting very character oriented, which seems like the things the mags are looking for. If you want to try some of your stories you can look into Nightmare Mag, or Clarkesworld, or even Hypnos. Each of those will pay for your stories, and they have a good fan base.

I know a lot of people like the self publishing route, but I kind of feel that is cheating. If you are an already established author, with a fan base and a few novels published, that is different, but for just breaking out, could be good, but more likely wouldn't work that great because you don't have that fan base and publishers tend to know what people would like.

At least, that is my feeling on it.