Sad Day for My Writing

I received an email this morning informing me that the Library of the Living Dead (the parent of Library of Science Fiction Press) is having financial difficulties.  They're putting all anthologies on hold for at least six months, and most are being cancelled entirely.  As it turns out, A Glitch in the Continuum, which was to hold my story Pandora's Time, didn't make the cut.

:(

The editor, Wayne Goodchild, has asked our permission to shop the anthology around for a month or so and see if another publisher would be willing to pick it up.  All the work (including formatting and cover art) is already done, so it seems possible that someone else might want an easy book to produce--but I don't know how that aspect of publishing works so I don't know how likely it is.

I've given my permission--I'd really like to see this anthology see the light of day, and on top of that, it takes me so long to get stories resubbed these days that it would probably be a month before I got it back out anyway.  The one thing I worry about, though, is how much payment I might receive.  It was contracted with The Library for $0.01 per word, but another press might not want to pay that much.  At this pay rate it's considered "semi-pro;" "pro" payment for stories is $0.05 per word or more.  Semi-pro is usually the minimum I sub to, unless a piece completely runs out of options.  Money IS supposed to flow towards the writer, after all.  I guess I've got to do some serious thinking about what minimum payment I'd be willing to receive.

Well, I can always duck out until I sign another contract.  I'm pretty proud of Pandora's Time and think it would have a fair shot elsewhere.  I'd like to see the antho stay together, but I also don't want to sell myself short.

This is very sad.  Only my second sale (though I have yet to be paid, and won't anymore) has fallen through.  I hope the book as a whole can find another home, but if not it's back to the slush...

*sigh*