Yeah, I submitted stories to Playboy. I did this mostly in college — Playboy had an annual (I believe) college fiction contest, and somehow I thought that this meant I had a better shot there. Plus, at the time Playboy was one of the biggest and best markets for short fiction in the country. They paid incredibly well, had terrific exposure (no pun intended), and had a certain level of prestige.
(For those of you have never cracked the spine of a copy of Mr. Hefner’s publication: No, the fiction in Playboy is not porn or sexual in nature. Or, rather, it doesn’t have to be.)
Every time I submitted, though, the result was the same:
I think we can all agree that Hustler magazine — while indubitably sleazier — had a much better rejection letter!
(And, yes — this is the second rejection from Playboy I’m showing in “This Week in Rejection!” I compared the notes and they’re the same…except for the address. Playboy had moved on; clearly I had not!)