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We all get it. We all hate it and we all have to deal with it.
As a writer, you have to deal with it constantly. If it isn't a publisher/agent or editor saying this isn't quite right, it is a son, sister or neighbour.
But this is how you begin to learn. One of the main things writers have to understand it that nothing you ever write is going to be perfect. Even when you've finished, polished at least four times your manuscript could undoubtedly be improved.
One persons view is going to be different from another's. No agents or publishers are going to be the same. Each have their own personal likes and dislikes. As writers it is our job to find the agent or publisher who loves our work as much as we do.
One problem with writing is that the work you produce may be important to you, you may think it is special and unique, but someone else could have had the same idea at the same time as you but their style suits the publisher and yours doesn't. Don't take it personally. This is a business, however much it hurts. If your writing is good enough, you will find a home for it.
Stick with it and you'll find that place and see your work in print.
1. Rejection without comment.
This is the worst rejection, but then again they probably haven't read it.
2. Bog standard letter.
At least they might have the title of the work on here. A step forward.
3. Bog Standard letter with a hand written note.
You are getting there. They've bothered to read it and make a quick comment.
4. Personalised rejection.
Yes! at last you've made contact with someone who has read, commented and taken time to give a little guidance.
5. Personalised rejection letter.
They like it but it doesn't fit in to their list, but you might try.....(so and so)
This is very positive and you should immediately research an agent, publisher or magazine that will be interested in the material.
Getting from rejection to the: please send me the rest of the manuscript is wonderful, but you can and do get rejected here too.
Each rejection is a step closer to publication. Look on rejection in a positive way and you'll stand a better chance of becoming published.
Well these are my thoughts, what are yours?
Rejection slip arrives, I look at it, think 'oh well, whatever', and then I slip it into another envelope and send it to the next victim on my list :0)
so come on tell us what do you do.
Over the weekend ITV3 were doing a Hercule Poirot weekend, and the Supersleuths programme about Poirot was repeated; I obvously missed it the first time I saw it, but apparently even the great Agatha Cristie was rejected by a couple of publishers in the early days.
Moral: There's hope for us all...persevere.
It is particularly disheartening getting the MS back after the encouragement of 'let us have the lot'; on the other hand they did at least like it enough to request more.
My way of dealing with it: back on the bike. I've just parcelled it all up again for the next agency.
Fairly positive, as rejections go. - I don't actually agree that the adults are 'flat' and don't intend to rewrite. The main character's parents and grandmother are quite rounded in my opinion; also they are described through the eyes of the teenage girl. Teenagers tend not to pay all that much attention to adults!
I received this letter at the weekend from an agent who told me that my writing was 'clean and straight forward' (which I'm taking is a compliment ... the alternative is that it's too simple) and that I seem to enjoy writing as the style is infectious.
The constructive criticisms were that it took a while to get going (which I have wondered about in the past ... my book starts with what is effectively the end scene of the first chapter and then the main character flashbacks to the previous 4 hours, which takes up the rest of the first chapter ... the rest of the book is forward going ... should be interesting to re-write).
The agent thought that my character should be younger than 30 if I'm aiming it at a young adult audience (not completely convinced by that one ... at present trying to see if changing the characters' ages affects the plot at all.)
The other comment was that my 'other world' should stand out more, i.e. it has much in common with lots of 'other worlds' that this agent has read. I can see the agent's point and it will be a challenge to make this world more interesting.
The only other personalised rejection letter I got from a big agency in London, who told me that there was nothing wrong with the writing but that the industry as a whole is in a dire state at the moment and good editors are getting rare.
The bog standard rejection letters, well, I tend not to dwell on them for more than a couple of minutes. If there's nothing there I can use to improve my writing, I just file it and make sure I don't send the same work there again.
Writing is hard. Getting published is ten times harder, if not more. I read somewhere that the success rate for a new author to get published is <1% ... well, those are better odds that winning the lottery or your plane crashing! There will be highs and there will be lows. That's life. Have a mope, then pick yourself up and get going.
Annie Wicking I agree you have to have rejection slips to be a real writer. One of these days the rejection will be a aceptance. Oh for that day!
MDD I love your thoughts. Isn't it great to share like this.
Richie, I'm with you each rejection is a step closer to a yes.
A good friend of mine once said after receiving yet another rejection- I can't stop now, I could be three rejections away from the yes. If I stop I'll never know, will I?
So keep at it all of you. I know I will, even when it looks like the well of inspiration is dry - it isn't I've just got to dig deeper.
I'm all for optimism, but there's got to be something realistic in there too. My other two novels and the children's book got nothing but rejections (each one got precisely one 'let us see the rest') and went back in the drawer to be recycled when (and that's when, not if) I find an agent/publisher.
Friends of mine have a saying: Build a bridge and get over it. :)
My take on this is that we don't ever get rejections, we just a new opportunity to re-work our submission for someone else. Was it Thomas Edison, inventor of the light-bulb, who said that he didn't have 10,000 failed light-bulbs but had managed to discover 10,000 ways to start over in a different way? Something like that anyway. The point is that if we think of a 'rejection' or 'failure' it can make us feel miserable, if we think of it as 'an opportunity to improve' or 'a way of NOT doing it', we can then feel better about it because we have the chance to get better and better each time until we acheive the result we want.
You got a rejection? Well done! This means you're well on the way to success because a) you finished something you were pleased with b) you have the nerve and confidence to submit and c) you now know how NOT! to approach an agent and d) you have eliminated an agent who was wrong for your work and e) you can submit to someone else with a proposal that is improved.
'It is impossible to win the race unless you venture to run, impossible to win the victory unless you dare to battle.' - Richard M. DeVos.
'THe most essential feature of a man is his improvableness.' - John Fiske
'If you can dream it, you can do it.' - Walt Disney
We have the problems at the time of diagnosis, guilt, why me? Think about all the problems it will cause in our lives and so on.
But like a lot of things, it's there for life, and you have to face reality. Insulin keeps me alive, if I didn't have it I'd be dead.
It's obvious which I prefer, so why complain.
You have a right to moan about things. And rejection is a part of everyday life for a lot of people.
Hopefully the therapy will enable you to work through it, and find a way to work around it.
Oh Carol, my Dad was diabetic from early age and had the old injections. Yes, you're right. I do get fed up of the stigma, which is changing with any luck, so I don't say much other than to trusted few (WN are so blinking trusted!) maybe that's why I write so much here.
Thank you, DD, I'll try emailing now hotmail sorted. Migraines are like Montezuma's Revenge of the Head - horrible, horrible and can waste so much of your time. I get them too (but thankfully not TOO often) with that sort of kaleidoscope vision; can't focus. Then it's the sheer pain and Migraleve (not much cop, I find).
Guess we all have our crosses to bear... sorry to seem so horrible to Sylvia but that hurt (ouch!)