Bards and Sages to Close

Effective March 6, 2024, Bards and Sages Publishing has begun “the process of winding down.” This includes both Bards and Sages Quarterly and The Society of Misfit Stories and the book publishing program. Back issues of the magazines will remain on sale until the end of 2024, and then all back issues will be removed from sale, and all rights will revert to their respective authors and artists. Editor Julie Ann Dawson will work with book authors individually to revert rights.

Dawson explains,

I have been struggling with mental health issues for some time now. I am being treated for generalized anxiety and depression, and though my condition has improved, I’m still not where I feel I need to be to properly commit the time and effort needed to being an effective publisher.

At the end of last year, I was diagnosed with additional physical health issues that will require surgery and treatment. While none of them are life-threatening, they are an additional weight that requires my attention.

As most people who have known me a while also realize, publishing has always been my love, but it has never been my primary income source. Like a lot of micro presses, I have a proverbial “day job,” and that day job has become increasingly more complex over the last few years.

All of these issues impacted my decision. However, I also have to confess to what may have been the final straws. AI…and authors behaving badly.

I am spending four to five hours a week trudging through submissions just to weed out AI-generated trash. I have editorial assistants who actually read and review the submissions, but I still look at every submission myself first to make sure I am weeding out the obvious junk before wasting their time, otherwise the submission response rate would take 20 months. Just over the weekend, I rejected twenty obviously AI generated submissions. My inbox is flooded with it….

To be clear, the majority of authors and artists I have worked with over the decades have been wonderful. But the number of badly-behaving individuals, and the increased level of hostility they bring to the industry, has gotten to be too much…. To those of you I have had the pleasure of working with over the decades, thank you for being a part of Bards and Sages Publishing. I am extremely proud of the works we produced over the years and I hope you are as well.

For more, see her announcement.

While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with a one-time or recurring donation. We rely on reader donations to keep the magazine and site going, and would like to keep the site paywall free, but WE NEED YOUR FINANCIAL SUPPORT to continue quality coverage of the science fiction and fantasy field.

©Locus Magazine. Copyrighted material may not be republished without permission of LSFF.