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CHAPTER VII

THE PLACING OF THE STORY

Irank the ability to sell a story nearly as high as the ability to write one. Unless you can dispose of your manuscript, after you have spent hours over it, your work counts for nothing. I have seen a great many young writers, some of pronounced ability, who have given up the literary profession because they were unable to sell their work. For this reason, I say that the selling is well nigh as important as the writing.

To place a story to good advantage, you must know the market through and through. It is not enough to know that the leading ten-cent magazines use love stories. You must know wherein those found in McClure's differ from those in Munsey's, in Everybody's, in The Cosmopolitan, in every other magazine that