Here's another angle on the whole thing: there have been one or two threads on rec.arts.sf.fandom which have covered in passing the weird tricks teachers can play on children.

I wouldn't be surprised if there is something on the reactions that can be traced back to what a teacher might have done.

(And, yes, I've had a few rejection letters. You're right about the emotional involvement of the author.)

Posted February 2, 2004 2:57 AM by Dave Bell

The valley plums are sweeter
But the mountain plums are colder;
We therefore thought it meeter
To plant them in our poulder.
The catalogs of gardners
Wherein the plums are listed,
Said in zones three through seven
At night plums should be misted.

Posted February 2, 2004 3:04 AM by James D. Macdonald

What you've posted here could be considered "Case Studies in How to Be an Oversensitive Git". I've known for a long time that us writers get attatched to our work and any rejection can sting badly, but really. After reading this I will definitely ensure that once I'm submitting manuscripts and collecting rejection slips, I will take a few deep breaths and a day away from thinking about the rejection letters I get before I make any sort of public reaction.

But then, I'm looking forward to collecting those letters [almost] as much as I'm dreading them - I'd like to think that the only sorts of letters that could really damage my ego would be a slip of paper with only the word "No." :)

Posted February 2, 2004 3:31 AM by Renatus

'Twas Friday, and the slush heap grows;
It rocks and teeters in my glare.
All hopeful, as the sheer height shows
Are the writers out there.

Beware the editor, my son!
With pens of red and eyes of pearl!
Beware the mail room glitch, and shun
The non-SASE-ed transom hurl!

I take the first sent screed in hand:
Long time the gibberish I scan--
I've never seen prose this damn bland;
Must answer; must make plan...

But as in weary thought I stood,
The bean counter, black tie on blouse,
Threw red spreadsheets, dodge though I could,
And cried for more cash cows!

I quit. I quit. My heart won't sing
I'm here to read, not to crush dreams.
I'm a lit geek, not marketing;
This underside's all seams.

But I have bills, and New York's cold;
Send no-thanks note, and move along.
At least he tried, his heart is bold;
Sign name to standard song.

'Twas Friday, and the slush heap grows;
It rocks and teeters in my glare.
All hopeful, as the sheer height shows
Are the writers out there.

Posted February 2, 2004 4:19 AM by Stephan Zielinski

I'm currently applying for teaching posts in creative writing, and if I ever get one I'm going to make it mandatory for my students to visit a Real Publisher, the smaller the better. There's a huge difference between knowing intellectually that the editors don't hate you, and seeing for yourself that the center of the main floor is awash in 900 poetry manuscripts submitted for a single competition, and having to delay manuscript returns for an extra six months because you're cleaning up after the office gets flooded, and reading cover letter after cover letter that screams PLEASE DON'T HURT MY FEELINGS in the nicest possible way.

Being an intern allows me to play God (we get to reject manuscripts ourselves, it's that small an operation), but it keeps me humble. Best of all possible worlds!

Posted February 2, 2004 5:55 AM by Dorothy Rothschild

I don't just mean the rejection itself, which they're bound to take personally, being writers and all.

If I took rejection personally, I'd never submit anything at all, least of all to people I actually know socially.

Since I substitute a conviction that I'm incapable of writing anything of commercial utility, I think I'm still up to my quota for character quirks.

Posted February 2, 2004 6:55 AM by Graydon

On a tangential note, may I suggest that sometime you post a picture of the slushpile? I've always wondered what it actually looks like -- the great mound of manila envelopes, shot through with whatever neon-colored ones their authors think will "draw notice".

Posted February 2, 2004 7:26 AM by Jaquandor

I laughed, I cried, I damn near peed my pants. That, my dear friend, is a classic and must be put into a
chapbook and handed out like bon-bons at writer's conferences and sf cons.

Signed,

ex reader of slush piles

Jane

Posted February 2, 2004 8:09 AM by jane

I once, briefly, helped out with some slushpile reading
for a publisher of erotic fiction, and you're right: you know
you're going to reject a good 80% or more of manuscripts within
the first two or three pages. It was depressing to discover
just how few would-be authors can string prose together
well enough to hold your attention for even that length. The
additional wrinkle with erotic fiction is that it has to be
arousing, of course, which much of the stuff submitted just
wasn't. Also, those who attempt to write it should have at least
a passing familiarity with basic human anatomy. I still remember
my surprise on encountering the line: "then he parted the twin
nodes of her clitoris". That one made me wince, and I'm not
even female. As a way of signalling the protagonist is having
sex with either an alien or a mutant, the line has possibilities,
but this was meant to be a physically normal human woman, alas.

I'm firmly of the opinion that every would-be author would
benefit from spending some time slushpile reading. It's both
a sobering and a humbling experience. It gave me an appreciation
of what models of restraint most letters of rejection are.

Oh, and if I ever submit a manuscript to anyone myself, I'm
doing so under a pseudonym.

Posted February 2, 2004 8:31 AM by Rob Hansen

Ah, Bartleby, Ah, humanity!

Posted February 2, 2004 8:50 AM by Jeffrey Kramer

Graydon, you're right. If you don't want to be rejected, don't submit.

And Rob, I think it would be humbling to read the slushpile. And instructional. But I just about fell out of my chair at the porno 'detail.' Yikes. Maybe if you write porn, you should get laid first? At least pick up an anatomy book or something? Yikes.

I had a journalism education and an editing professor who looked like I imagine Jehovah might, very tall, curly white hair and beard, ruddy complexion..... and he yelled at us if we screwed up.

The only time I've ever gotten upset (I read it and started crying, it also upset Jim because he doesn't like seeing me cry) at a rejection notice was a nastygram I got from MZB, but I'd also had a really rotton time at work that day.. The story she slagged ended up at Eldritch Tales after being rejected by all the magazines that might have published horror or fantasy -- I got lots of letters saying, 'it's a really nice story but we only publish fantasy, not horror: or the inverse. I kept thinking "if it's a really nice story, why don't you just publish it?"

Posted February 2, 2004 9:02 AM by Paula Helm Murray

I love reading this sort of thing. It's helpful and encouraging in the oddest of ways. (BTW, I read slush for a very short period of time because I knew some people on the staff of the Leading Edge at WhyBeYou, AKA BYU, and they were kind enough to let me help them weed out said slush pile. Well, kind in the sense that they knew they were slaking my curiosity about the whole publishing process. I'm not sure if letting me read some of the manuscripts I read was precisely kind, but it was informative.)

Rob: Twin nodes??? I'd wince too....

I must read this more when I'm not at work.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:04 AM by PiscusFiche

Entitlement is bizarre.

All the same, rejection is a slap in the face.

Submitting a manuscript is like a combination of applying for a lifechanging job and going down on one knee to propose marriage; when it's rejected after a looooooooooooooooooong wait, I think it's a natural human impulse to want to lash out at the person rejecting, because otherwise they're all alone with the fact that they're not good enough.

Even that nice rejection that hopes to see the book in print elsewhere is saying the book isn't good enough. And that woman is going to have to wait while it sits in the slush for another year elsewhere. It doesn't start higher because it's been almost accepted. So near, and yet... back to the bottom of the slide again, still inadequate.

It's rejection. Your work is being rejected for not being good enough. This does objectively suck and people can't be expected to enjoy it.

They're not hurting the editor by bitching about it online, surely -- if they sent the cat-shit, yes, then! Bitching isn't productive in the way working to make their writing better would be, but I expect it gives them a support structure and helps them feel less suicidal.

Useful advice for people who have trouble submitting anything because rejection feels like someone stamped on your head -- don't submit something until you have the next thing after finished. That way when it's rejected, you can think, well, maybe that one sucked, but I have got better already since then. And if you get rejection 12 above, you can email right back and say "Ah, OK, well, how about this one". With a novel it suffices to write a new one while the old one is waiting in the slush, if the old one is any good at all, you'll certainly have time.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:05 AM by Jo Walton

This kind of behavior is caused by 'entitlement gnomes,' little fae creatures that whisper in writer's ears at night and tell us that we deserve to be published.

Which always makes me want to quote Bill Munny from Unforgiven: "Deserve's got nothing to do with it, Kid."

Posted February 2, 2004 9:19 AM by Elizabeth Bear

I wonder what they'd make of this one:

"We have read your manuscript with boundless delight. If we were to publish your paper, it would be impossible for us to publish any work of lower standard. And as it is unthinkable that in the next thousand years we shall see its equal, we are, to our regret, compelled to return your divine composition, and to beg you a thousand times to overlook our short sight and timidity." (a rejection from a Chinese economic journal)

Posted February 2, 2004 9:22 AM by Jennifer

Jane, if I've made you laugh that hard, my week is made. Feel free to use the piece ad libitum wherever it seems good.

Paula, the normal first reaction to reading slush is to get slushdrunk -- giddy, unbalanced, amazed in its full original sense. I know I've told this story here before, but the time I left Cory Doctorow, Jim Macdonald, Debra Doyle, and Lawrence Watt-Evans sedately reading manuscripts (they were in the office the afternoon of the annual SFWA Authors' and Editors' Party, a.k.a. the Mill and Swill), and came back later to find them sprawled, helplessly giggling, upon and amidst what had previously been tidy if superannuated heaps of unread slush, was a wonderful moment. I wish I'd gotten pictures.

The second reaction to reading slush is to realize that you're a much, much better writer than you'd previously appreciated.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:22 AM by Teresa Nielsen Hayden

What these guys have failed to understand about rejection is that it isn't personal. If you're a writer, you're more or less constitutionally incapable of understanding that last sentence ... Obviously, you've never met a writer in your entire life. You should have stopped that sentence right there.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:49 AM by Andrew Brown

Actually, I can tell you the best way to have writers understand the editorial process of rejection (not to mention the editorial process of editing): Have them become editors themselves. I was the editor of a humor site on AOL serveral years ago, at which I ended up rejecting 98%+ of the material sent to me, and a fair number of hours massaging the less than 2% of material I accepted. After I was done with that gig, I pretty much went back to every editor I had worked with up to that time and apologized for being a jerk (they were usually tolerantly amused). It's also saved me a great deal of internal angst regarding rejection, since, having rejected thousands myself, I no longer worked under the illusion that the rejection was personalized venom.

It's not practical, of course, to have every writer become a submissions editor, but perhaps what need to be done is to create a site that has 20 examples of writing, most bad, but some really good. Have writers go there and say to them "You're the editor. You can choose only one to accept. You have to reject everyone else. Choose, and then write the rejection letters as well." And then tell them for that the full editor experience, they'd have to do this every day with a new batch of submissions -- except that they would be able accept only two pieces in a full week.

You might get *some* writers who would be willing to write 138 personalized rejection notes, but I think most of them would finally get the idea of what rejection means from the editorial side. It's not personal because among other things, really, who has the time?

Posted February 2, 2004 9:51 AM by John Scalzi

"Yes" to everything Jo said, which leads me to ask why does rejection hurt people? I suspect a big chunk of the reason is to do with the way people think of writing as an expression of identity. If you write and sell books, you are not someone who writes and sells books for your day job, you are a writer. It's an issue of self-identity. People who write think of themselves as being writers; thus, to have their writing rejected is to question an aspect of their identity.

In these cases, it's an aspect of their identity that needs to be questioned. "Being a writer" is about receiving rejection letters, shrugging, filing them, and going on. "Being a writer" is about walking a tightrope strung between the twin pillars of what-the-readers-want and what-I-want-to-say, above the abyss of obscurity. "Being a writer" is frequently a tedious, exhausting, isolating, financially insecure existence. Franz Kafka was no less a writer for never seeing a rejection letter for a novel (almost all of his works being published posthumously): why, then, the need so many people exhibit for their status of "being a writer" to be publicly acknowledged?

The whole issue of why so many people harbour romantic misconceptions about the literary lifestyle is one that needs to be examined if we're to understand why so many people respond badly to rejection letters. And here I think other writers are partially to blame, for in all too many fictions about writers we see them presented as free, and wealthy, and fulfilled ...

Wish-fulfillment, anyone?

Posted February 2, 2004 10:01 AM by Charlie Stross

I collected about fifteen agent-and-editor rejections on my first novel. Two of the agents hadn't bothered with a rejection form, but had just scribbled "no thanks" across the bottom of my own query letter and sent it back. This threw me into an absolute snit at the time - although, reading them over a year later, I can't quite see why.

Rejections suck. Form rejections really suck, because they suggest that you didn't even make it to #11 on Teresa's list. A certain amount of directionless anger is to be expected. Turning it into directed anger is, however, not a good idea... especially on the all-searchable, all-remembering Internet. I try to remind myself that, if I ever do become published and famous, every stupid rant I've ever posted on a listserve, messageboard, blog, or, well, comments thread, will be fair game to everyone, including my biographers.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:28 AM by K. Feete

I collected about fifteen agent-and-editor rejections on my first novel. Two of the agents hadn't bothered with a rejection form, but had just scribbled "no thanks" across the bottom of my own query letter and sent it back. This threw me into an absolute snit at the time - although, reading them over a year later, I can't quite see why.

Rejections suck. Form rejections really suck, because they suggest that you didn't even make it to #11 on Teresa's list. A certain amount of directionless anger is to be expected. Turning it into directed anger is, however, not a good idea... especially on the all-searchable, all-remembering Internet. I try to remind myself that, if I ever do become published and famous, every stupid rant I've ever posted on a listserve, messageboard, blog, or, well, comments thread, will be fair game to everyone, including my biographers.

And no matter how hurt, frustrated, angry, and rejected I feel - a year later I probably won't be able to remember why.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:29 AM by K. Feete

Wow. AOL turns down submissions. To look at "hot or not" you could never tell.

I'm a violent (yes) proponent of the amateurization of communication and entertainment, especially on the web, but I must admit that it hasn't helped editors when every schmuck thinks he deserves "The Atlantic Monthly."

Humor is the worst. I'm about to kick off an independent college zine, and I want to hire a stranger to tell kids, "You are not funny. If you were just a bad writer, I'd be comfortable telling you, but this is personal. When you suck at jokes, you suck at life."

Then again, as an editor who uses "suck" in business communication, I shouldn't set my standard too high.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:29 AM by Nick Douglas

Nick Douglas writes:

"Wow. AOL turns down submissions. To look at 'hot or not' you could never tell."

I'll thank you not to mock AOL too mercilessly, as even now they pay me to blog, so I like them. But suffice to say that this particular area was run like a small magazine, while most of AOL is designed to elicit member participation, and the two, while individually worthwhile in their own ways, do not have the same selection process involved.

K. Feete: Don't read too much (heh) into form rejections. I used them often, even with material I liked but couldn't use, most of the time because I had several other things I needed to be doing.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:44 AM by John Scalzi

Having been author, agent, editor, and head of a company that owns a magazine, I can see the slush pile matter from four sides.

All the horrors are as Teresa says.

Setting aside the normal protocol of rejection slips, which are intended to be self-explanatory, strange things happen.

However, the crushing effect of even an enlightened and talented author comes from the total contradictions in rejection letters letters for the SAME specific manuscript.

I have had the same short story described as "too long", "too short", "too downbeat", "too techno-optimist", "too boxy" [whatever that means], "too many metaphors and similes", "great use of language", "too much sex", "too much science"... and so forth.

At a high point, I had over 300 mss in circulation at once (including many poems), and kept track by the computer system at Boeing (this was 1979-1980) which one of what characteristics had gone where, when, to which editor, of a market with what self-description, with a described response time of what, and should therefore be re-queried when. I also had my own evaluation of my perceived quality of each manuscript.

The results of statistical analysis of roughly 1,000 submissions include:

* There is no correlation whatsoever between how good I think a manuscript is and how many submissions it takes to sell

* There is an optimal number of poems to send in a single envelope. More than that peak increases the chance of rjection without comment. Less makes suboptimal use of the postage, overhead, and delay.

* As Heinlein preached, once you have written it, finished it (correct format and spelling), and submitted it, the optimal thing to do is resubmit again and again until sold. Do NOT waste time on unsolicited rewrite. Do NOT delay starting to write the next, independent, manuscript.

What I learned on interpretation:

Don't EVER take a rejection letter (let alone slip) personally. Tell yourself: "the editor had a bad day, unrelated to my manuscript; great, now I can submit to an even better market" -- and resubmit within 24 hours.

Somewhere (very incompatible software over25 years) I have many pages of the data, especially the utterly absurd key words and key phrases on the mutually and internally inconsistent rejections.

Yes, 90% of PUBLISHED science fiction is crap.

Yes, 90% of everything is crap.

BUT: 99%+ of science fiction slush is crap.

AND: 90% of science fiction rejections are crap.

This does not automatically mean: 90% of science fiction editors are crap.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:44 AM by Jonathan Vos Post

Wow. That was entertaining and educational.

I think Charlie is onto something here, though. There's a definite image associated with "being a writer", and "being a writer" often has very little to do with the actual act of writing. It mostly seems to involve angst and sitting around in public attempting to look creative. I'm not sure what it accomplishes for the people who do it, but hey, whatever gets you through the night.

I think the problem is that the public does not perceive writing to be a business or occupation: they perceive it as an art form. And artists are apparently allowed to be moody, sulky, tempramental, nasty, unprofessional, childish brats in our society. So those who are busy "being a writer" will emulate this behaviour, in order to appear more writerly and thus impress those around them with how artsy they are.

Writers, on the other hand, tend more towards polite and professional, because writers understand how much work goes into this gig. And maybe that's the way it should be left. After all, we need some way to seperate the men from the boys... ;)

Posted February 2, 2004 10:47 AM by Leah Bobet

I think Charlie is right on the money about the romantic-identity thing. I've never read slush, but I've evaluated resumes and job applications in quantity...it's the job applicant's livelihood at stake, and yet they don't as a rule get nearly so worked up about rejection. (And, incidentally, it's pretty easy to weed the vast majority of resumes, too, for many of the same reasons one rejects manuscripts.)

In American culture, a lot of weight is ascribed to what one does as a living, so a job might be called an identity. But work is then about who one is, whereas the "being a writer" notion is about who one wishes to be.

And deny people their fantasies, and oh my will they get touchy.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:51 AM by Becky Maines

An editor who’s had an extraordinary run of submission luck one year might look differently at a rewritten book that came back to her in a sparser year.

But are there really sparse years? I realize only a small proportion of stuff that goes into the hopper makes it past all those hurdles you cite, but with SO much stuff coming in, is it really possible to go a year and not get, what was the number for this small house, seven manuscripts that you want to publish? Wow. I can't decide if I find that encouraging or discouraging.

Posted February 2, 2004 10:57 AM by John Sullivan

Heh, sorry John, that was knee-jerk of me. Thanks for telling me about the user-participation vs. magazine-style divide; should've seen that.

Is there a chance I can copy this and use it as my rejection form letter? I'm talking under 100 submissions a year, so this page has seen more eyeballs this morning than it will for my 3-year (assuming I do graduate from college) editing career.

And the third bird for the stone: Any of these writers could splurge for a "Writer's Market" copy and save themselves all this pain and suffering. In fact, most publishers could merely send the Library of Congress info for "Writer's Market," followed by the words "Buy this," as their rejection slip.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:03 AM by Nick Douglas

I've logged a grand two rejections in my two-month-old endeavor to get my book represented. The only reason the second one bothered me was because Satan had spent a decent amount of time constructing my day before I checked the mail. He must've been sitting back with a cold beer, waiting for my expression upon finding that letter at the end of that day. Hats off, Herr Teufel, that day was a grand piece of work.

I haven't had to read through fiction slush, but I have had to read through science slush. I've graded eighty "essays" on geologic eras by high school freshmen, and I've graded thirty "reports" on various scientific investigations by college freshmen. I'll never forget one pre-med student, upon receiving his C paper, working his mouth in shock and finally getting out, "But, but, but I've been published!" Because this punk had been irking me for the entire semester, my Polite Check failed me and I returned, "That paper wouldn't have gotten published." The other grad student TAs and I came up with a drinking game for grading these papers: for every time you have to scribble in red "figure legends go beneath the figure, table titles go above the table", take a shot; for every time you have to write "referenced figures not included with paper", finish the bottle; etc.

No matter what you do in life, "Read the instructions and follow them" should be a mantra when you are submitting anything to another person. Right along with "If at first you don't succeed" and "It's up to me".

Posted February 2, 2004 11:14 AM by Kellie

The other thing that I think applies here is this. If you're an editor, chances are you are a reader (and probably writer) who LOVES the stuff you're editing. And after a while, the piles and piles of unedited, terrible, identical to the last one you rejected junk (because SO MUCH of it is junk) are really, really disheartening, and depressing. I just can't stand to look at poetry sometimes because I have to read the stuff people send my website, which is straight out of the teen angst "oh why does the world not recognize my genius" department. But if I am too gentle in my rejection letter, sometimes the same author sends me MORE stuff, and it's JUST AS BAD. So the rejection letter has to be polite enough for them to not write back and tell me what a raging bitch I am, yet firm enough to let them know I really don't want any more of whatever it was they sent.

The standard "doesn't meet the editorial needs of the magazine" is a bit formulaic, but it really catches so much. Why doesn't it meet the needs? It sucks? It's about killing women violently yet pretending to be by a woman? It's porn you want to try to sneak past me on my nonporn site? Or maybe it's some other subject matter we don't publish.

And I guess one thing about this is that it isn't actually personal, in a way. I don't have anything against those people who tried and sent me something and just don't realize it's not so good. But in another way, it's personal in that I have a limited amount of time in my life to read and I wish all of them WERE geniuses-- it's personal to me, and I just don't have to time to figure out the perfect way to not hurt your feelings. ESPECIALLY when I read these rejection letters that were really nice, and they read "being a total bitch" into them. I just can't win, so why NOT use the standard form rejection? When you take the time to write a nice note, it just gives people all the more to obsess over.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:23 AM by Kim Wells

Actually, under the circumstances described--a submission via a friend in common--I thought this rejection letter was a tad too harsh.

It's these lines that got to me:

> I absolutely believe that your children love it, but there is a real difference between a told story and a written one. And I am afraid that PRINCE JASON AND THE MAGIC STAR is just too slight and too sentimental to make a successful book.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:26 AM by Melissa Singer

For some reason, only part of this posted the first time . . . trying again.

Actually, under the circumstances described--a submission via a friend in common--I thought this rejection letter was a tad too harsh.

It's these lines that got to me:

> I absolutely believe that your children love it, but there is a real difference between a told story and a written one.

This is true, but I can smell a faint whiff of condescension here on the part of the editor. I think it's in the phrase "your children."

> And I am afraid that PRINCE JASON AND THE MAGIC STAR is just too slight and too sentimental to make a successful book.

I'd keep the "slight" but lose the "sentimental." Actually, I would try to find another way to say all of this . . . .

"I think storytelling is a wonderful skill, as much about the performance as it is about the story itself. Perhaps because of the performance aspect, it's always seemed to me to be very difficult to turn a told story into a written one. I think you've made a noble effort with JASON, but I don't think it quite works on paper.

If I'm rejecting something that came to me through a friend, I want to do my best to ensure that the friend isn't going to get slammed by the submitting author. I also want to make sure that my friend doesn't wind up angry at me.

Posted by Melissa Singer at February 2, 2004 11:26 AM

Posted February 2, 2004 11:28 AM by Melissa Singer

There's the chiastic rejection from Samuel Johnson: "Your manuscript is both good and original; but the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good."

He is also said to have rejected a manuscript with "I am in the smallest room of my house, and your manuscript is before me. Soon it shall be behind me."

Now that's harsh.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:38 AM by Lisa

Hi, someone linked me to this. I also read and reject (and very occasionally accept) manuscripts.

You're right on the money about reasons for rejection, especially #1 and #2. It's amazing how much pain and heartbreak (and wasted paper) could be avoided if writers simply did their frickin' homework or used a spellchecker.

Anyway, thanks.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:39 AM by farklebarkle

I needed to see this today. It was exactly the sort of bitch-slap I needed to get me back behind my writing desk and actually submitting things again rather than whining about how I'll never be a real writer because I can't take rejection.

Even though I actually work with editors and should in fact know better, it was so important for me to be reminded that I'm not personally being rejected, my work is (and if it's at all good, it won't be rejected forever). I think I'm going to go write "they don't hate you, they're just doing their jobs" in Sharpie on my monitor so I never forget again.

So thanks for that.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:45 AM by Jess

For a fairly good picture of the hell that is slush, SFRevu has a series of shots of the Tor offices from 2002 here.

My favorites are the latest in slush furniture and the slush of Isengard.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:56 AM by Kat

Oh man. Thanks for writing this. I find myself having a variety of responses to it:

1) I'm horrified that people say those things about editors in public, pointing out to all and sundry that, at the very least, their reading comprehension skills are so very weak;

2) I'm terrified that I will respond this way when I finally get around to submitting my dearest darling manuscript, the one I've been editing for the last year and a half;

3) I'm pleased that I have not yet submitted my manuscript before it is the very best story it can be; and

4) I'm heartened to see how many fuckwits are trying to publish novels, which can only make the rest of us look brilliant by contrast.

Posted February 2, 2004 11:58 AM by Ivy Blossom

"All the same, rejection is a slap in the face."

No, it isn't.

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mgn tht y r jwlr pckng dmnds. Y rn't mkng vl jdgmnt b chsng sm vr thrs, y r smpl ttmptng t fnd stns tht wll SLL t yr cstmrs t prc y cn prft frm. Th fct tht sm dmnds gt sd t mk cttng tls nd thrs g n th rngs f rch y-cnd s bsnss dcsn, nt "slp n th fc" f th ppl wh mnd th gms, r th ppl wh ct thm, r th ppl wh sld thm t whlslrs. t's jst BSNSS ppl.

Gt grp.

Posted February 2, 2004 12:14 PM by John

Brava, Teresa. I laughed, I cried, I drank a cup of plum tea. I think I recognize a couple of those.

Melissa, have I mentioned lately that I love you?

Posted February 2, 2004 12:23 PM by Beth Meacham

The more I look at the grumbles of "a poetry parodist from Texas", the more suspicious I get. The complaint about produce looks just a little bit over the top. And that "whatever" part:

And that "whatever" part. How specific. How to the point. I think I'm going to go torture myself now.

feels, in this more cynical light, kind of self-congratulatory. "Hey, what if I wanted to parody a poetry editor rejecting someone? Wouldn't adding 'whatever' at the end of a riff on William Carlos Williams and Kenneth Koch be just perfect? How specific! How to the point! Score!"

Then again, human cluelessness is a powerful force in the world. But I am still suspicious.

C. -- no relation to WCW.

PS The link highlighted by "completely missing the point" has two conjoined URLs.

Posted February 2, 2004 12:44 PM by Carlos

A couple more Tor slush pile pictures from September 2003, immediately after Patrick's Noble Assistant had Slaughtered The Slush Pile, are here and here. (Also note our gracious hostess' (is that the appropriate apostrification?) right hand in the second picture.) :)

I have a file folder in my, er, file cabinet (clever, wot?) entitled 'Rejection letters -- the fools, the fools!' I usually keep rejection letters on my desk for about two days, which is enough time to get over the breath-taking OW of it all, and then putting the letter in my FOOLS! folder makes everything much better. :)

I can't imagine going online and ranting endlessly about the vicious heartless nasty bad awful publishers who rejected me. The publishing industry's an *awfully* small pond to be pissing in. Besides, it's much more fun to go around the house yelling, "the fools! the fools!" Well, for me it is, anyway. Possibly I'm a little odd. :) (But full of smiley faces this morning, apparently.)

-Catie

Posted February 2, 2004 12:57 PM by Catie Murphy

Lisa: "I am in the smallest room in my house." etc. is actually from the German composer Max Reger, in response to a negative newspaper review of his music.

Posted February 2, 2004 1:11 PM by Chris Quinones

Somebody signing themselves only "John" quotes Jo Walton's observation that "All the same, rejection is a slap in the face," and responds:

No, it isn't.

Jeez, you would think that anyone who submits something to a company that charges money for their publications would automatically know that publishing is a BUSINESS.

This means the ONLY reason they would even consider publishing your work is because they think it can be sold for a profit. Therefore, even the thought that they are someohow judging the author is just hubris on the part of the writer since the author is nothing more than the "generator" of the product being offered for sale.

Imagine that you are a jeweler picking diamonds. You aren't making a value judgement by choosing some over others, you are simply attempting to find stones that will SELL to your customers at a price you can profit from. The fact that some diamonds get used to make cutting tools and others go on the rings of rich eye-candy is a business decision, not a "slap in the face" of the people who mined the gems, or the people who cut them, or the people who sold them to wholesalers. It's just BUSINESS people.

Get a grip.

Teresa was writing as a human being who works inside the publishing industry, and reflecting on the various different ways people in different roles see themselves in relation to the literary submissions process. Jo was adding her own note of personal perception--pointing out that although, as Teresa pointed out, editors don't mean a rejection personally, nonetheless for the writer it's probably going to feel that way.

"John" isn't adding anything to this except a bullyragging insistence that the values of business--excuse me, "BUSINESS"--must be paid tribute to at every stage of the conversation. For Jo to reflect on how the transaction feels to her as a human participant is impermissable--she must be shouted down. "It's just BUSINESS people. Get a grip."

This is the kind of culture we're turning into: a culture run by people like "John."

Posted February 2, 2004 1:22 PM by Patrick Nielsen Hayden

Very entertaining and educational post, Teresa!

I let fear of rejection stop me from submitting for many years. But then at Necon a few years back (this would have been right before VP) I realized that the only thing holding me back from being a published writer was my own fear. So ta-da, off to the post office I went, and though it took a little time to toughen up, I can honestly say that most of the time I now shrug rejections off as just part of doing business. It helps, perhaps, that I don't read the rejections too closely before I toss them into a shoebox under my desk. People who obsess over every little word and phrase, who think or write vile thoughts about editors, who nurture every real or perceived slight--these people, I think, need to get some perspective. Basketball players don't worry about the baskets they *don't* make, unless it's to use that knowledge to help improve their game--and rejections come in so many shapes and colors, and for so many reasons, that I think they're useless as far as telling you how to improve a story, if that's in fact what the story needs.

If a rejection does hit close to the heart, which some invariably do, oh well. It's why they invented Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough Ice Cream. You get over it or you don't, you stop writing or you don't. Simple.

Posted February 2, 2004 1:22 PM by Sandra McDonald

As an interested third-party with experience of neither editing nor authorship, I wonder if the disconnect might be more related to different codes of language. The Editor is writing in the code of her profession, into which the Author has yet to be initiated. The words simply don't mean the same things to the different readers.

For example, when an editor calls a submission 'sentimental', that's professionally a note on a specific dynamic in the writing that needs changing, in effect saying "ease up on the mush, and it might be a better work. Rewrite it." The hapless author, however, understands it to mean "Your writing is mawkish, and nauseatingly saccharine. Give up writing, now, and never ever consider yourself an author again. Try Hollywood."

It's not just the differing context of writing and reading the rejection, but the very words themselves that provoke such bile. What fun.

Posted February 2, 2004 1:31 PM by Alexander

Jo: Bitching isn't productive in the way working to make their writing better would be, but I expect it gives them a support structure and helps them feel less suicidal.

Makes sense. OTOH, it also reinforces misconceptions about the publishing industry and gives people the opportunity to publicly display their lack of reading comprehension, in a forum that might well be read by the people they are slagging, or acquaintances thereof, whichever (see the teen writer).

Your advice is much more helpful than mine, which is: don't do the bitching in public.

(Wading into fanfic archives, btw, has to be much like reading slush. Except on screen.)

Posted February 2, 2004 1:32 PM by Kate Nepveu

I normally get into a panic state just thinking about the moment when I have to send the baby out the door into the cold cruel world, but this was actually rather encouraging, if only because I'm sure I can get at least to step #8 and quite possibly as far as #11, and I'm very good at things like SASEs. And I may stand rejection, as long as there's clearly a human being on the other end. (Some day, we will all be rejected by computers. Will we feel better or worse?)

Posted February 2, 2004 1:36 PM by Erica

Oy.

I understand why people would not like to receive rejection letters (after all, what's to like?), it's just the... disconnection with reality that gets me.

It occurs to me that the experience may be somewhat different for writers who have actually published something, or for writers who hang out in places like this, than it is for the people posting on RejectionLetters. If you have some inkling of what actually goes on at publishers - and anyone who reads this blog should - you have context, so your anger at a rejection isn't likely to go off in silly directions.

And if you've been published, you are less likely to be wildly overestimating your abilities (the Particles link from a few weeks ago about people not knowing their weaknesses is desperately relevant here).

I myself have spent very little time reading slush. I was on the non-fiction editorial review board for my college's literary magazine, but we didn't get anything entertainingly bad that I can recall - nothing below an 8 on the list (of course Sarah Lawrence has a strong emphasis on writing).

What this really made me think of was resumes, from back when we had open job postings and I'd also troll Monster with keyword searches. Resumes obtained through these processes can be quite slushy. I recall one which included a lengthy section about how the job hunter was planning to run for the United States Senate (complete with platform), one handwritten on yellow lined paper which at some point started discussing the job seeker's desire to be dominated by women (actually my wife found this one), and the one which I treasure for the classic simplicity of the Monster title - "SENIOR QAULITY ENGINEER."

This is why so many companies use recruiting firms. They're agents.

Posted February 2, 2004 1:37 PM by Dan Blum

Fascinating, Teresa. And if you think it's bad in fiction (most of my work and experience on the other side of the manuscript is with serious nonfiction publishers)...

Scrivener's Error: Marvin the Misunderstood Manuscript

Posted February 2, 2004 1:52 PM by C.E. Petit

What a great post. I think there's just something about rejection relating to story that sparks extreme reactions. I don't think it's just writers, maybe it's rejection itself. I don't know.

I've never read slush, but I did work as a used book buyer for a time. Otherwise normal customers used to behave in the oddest ways when selling their books.

I still remember one woman, who brought in a box of books that reeked of cat urine; it was sticky and dusty and scary. I asked her, politely, to take her books out of the box and place them on the counter (we always asked everyone to do this, as boxes hide many nasty things.)

The woman refused, saying the books had cat pee on them, and she didn't want to touch them. I explained that it was our policy not to remove books from boxes and that if she didn't want to touch them, I certainly wasn't going to.

I asked her, nicely, if *she* would buy books with urine on them, and she said, "No!" She still had a hard time linking that reaction to her books.

Our head book buyer had a variety of rejection softening techniques. The one I remember the best was the way he'd start his rejection with the word "yes". "Yes, thanks, we don't need any of these."

Reading the editorial letters, it sure looks like the editors are trying to soften the blow. Not sure it will ever succeed, really. Maybe that's just the nature of the game?

Posted February 2, 2004 1:59 PM by Elizabeth

A friend of mine, probably in a moment somewhere between the blue form of death from ROF and the didn't grab,hold, work from JJA, has commented that if she ever became a slush editor, she'd buy twelve packs of colored paper, shuffle them, and use them to print rejections, thus forever bewildering the writers, who'd spend countless hours trying to compare and figure out what each color stood for.

The only cure from rejection is the realization that one's identity is separate from one's product. Unfortunately, easier said than done.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:04 PM by Ilona

Reading these makes me feel downright well-adjusted. I barely even glance at rejections anymore; update the records, file, and move on. Occasionally I post a positive one on the desk for a while: a little egoboo.

The coldest rejection I ever got was from a rather important, well-known, SF-oriented agency. They sent back my original letter with "NOT FOR US" rubber-stamped on it. Gotta give 'em points for brevity.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:10 PM by Holly M.

Beth wrote: >Melissa, have I mentioned lately that I love you?

um, well, gosh, she said, blushing.

Always nice to hear.

I learned at least some of that sort of thing from you, you know . . . .

Posted February 2, 2004 2:17 PM by Melissa Singer

My first ever rejection letter was... interesting. I had sent some poems in for a competition, and received a pleasant, polite letter informing me that, however good my poems were, they weren't quite good enough. What got me was that the letter was addressed to "Mr Farmar". I realised that I'd signed the cover letter "KR Farmar", and one of the poems was a love poem addressed to a woman. Naturally, the editor assumed I was a man...

I kept that rejection letter pinned up on my bedroom wall for years afterwards, as an encouragement to doing better in future.

Since then I haven't sent out much, but my rejection letters have been getting steadily less discouraging, from the agent who said my novel was "very odd... we don't think it's a strong enough story" (it wasn't) to the magazine who said "the story ends too abruptly" (it did) to another magazine who didn't say very much at all (but having reread the story and taken a look at the calibre of writing they normally publish, I'm more relieved than surprised -- it would have been an embarrassment if it had been published; as it is it can moulder in a drawer until I'm dead and my executors publish it as "juvenilia"), to an almost-an-acceptance-but-not-quite from Marvel Comics. (And I know for a fact that Marvel were undergoing internal problems at the time, which lessens the sting of their refusal to publish my script as it stood. Plus, the editor said I was talented. Just thinking about that gives me a warm glow.)

Of course, I've worked for my parents' publishing company off and on since I was 14, so my attitude is somewhat different from the norm...

Posted February 2, 2004 2:18 PM by Katherine Farmar

This is very off-topic. But:

"On the other hand, if all you want are affirmations, go to an AA meeting."

Have you ever been to an AA meeting? I'm just curious. I've never gone to an AA meeting wanting only affirmations, and I've never experienced one as being only affirmations, either.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:22 PM by Moira Russell

I'm doing slushkilling right this moment - well, I mean, doing business hours - as an intern in a small small publisher. Today I got a manuscript I was really, really sorry for - I mean, my heart really bled for the poor kid. She didn't have clue one about writing. And it meant so obviously f***ing much to her.

While I was crooning my sorrow for her, quoting choice passages from her manuscript, I became aware of the other interns looking at me - those who agonize for one whole day over one manuscript, read all of it through, take notes, and write long rejection comments on the manuscripts received log.

One of them was looking at me with something between admiration and terror and told me: "If I ever write something, I never, never want to be read by you."

Well, somebody has to play the villain, I guess. It does get the slushpile down in a hurry.

It's true though: slushreading makes you realize you're a far better writer than about 95% of them. It made me want to get back to writing for a while, even from the deepest depths of depression. Didn't last past office hours, but it's a start.

Mostly, when I read slush, besides feeling sorry I feel a sense of admiration for the poor bastards. They may not have a clue or a good command of the language but by God they did sit down and hack out the thing letter by letter. That's a hard thing to do. It's this admiration that made me finally sit down and finish my first novel. I wish there was a way to convey that admiration through a "Thank you, but no" letter, but the sorry fact is, sometimes you really don't want to encourage them.

What those people at the site don't realize is that sometimes the polite form rejection is a lot nicer than what goes through your head reading the stuff. There's the ones you feel sorry for but there's also the ones you'd like to smack.

Then again, I can't throw stones. I got really mad at my first rejection.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:31 PM by Anna Feruglio Dal Dan

Thank you for that entry. I see myself stalling around #8 or #9. My insurance doesn't cover psychotherapy, so I guess I'll have to keep writing until my prose and psyche improve.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:31 PM by ChrisO

Rejection letters are like war medals. I have half a dozen or so at this point and in some ways would feel a little betrayed if I didn't amass at leats a dozen. From the tone, I get the feeling Most Agents and Editors find my MS to be a catagory 13, which is heartening as it means I simply haven't found the right publisher yet.

I get miffed for all of about thirty three seconds and then realize that it isn't personal. These people don't know me. I'm a stranger asking an impertinant question of a busy profeshoinal. I'm lucky they don't send howlers.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:39 PM by Keith

Elizabeth -

I think it depends a lot on the nature of the blow.

I'm completely unpublished; I expect that I'm going to stay that way. The point of trying to get published, sending things I've written off to publishers, is to give myself an opportunity to be wrong about that. (Since I'd rather live in the universe where someone is willing to bet money that something I've written is widely entertaining than not.)

I find that having manuscripts rejected still sucks rocks, in a 'yup, I'm cursed' sort of way.

If the manuscript had gone out in a positive hope, instead of a negative one -- wanting to be right about being a good writer, instead of wanting to be wrong about being an inherently noncommercial one -- it would, I think, hurt rather more.

I don't think it matters that the decision by the editors at the publisher is fundamentally commercial; while that's true, there isn't any change in the personal consequences.

Which is where I think the impulse to soften the blow comes in; one doesn't want it to be a blow, and has no idea how hard it will fall (since that depends so much on the author's state of being), and one has to do it anyway. The preference for doing it as delicately as possible under the circumstances makes a lot of sense.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:48 PM by Graydon

Interesting. In high school, before I came to the realization that I just wasn't good at thinking up new and interesting plots, I wrote and submitted a few science fiction short stories. (And, I blush to admit, rhyming poems, not good ones, including one in re: Challenger that began "you toil aloft on triple tounges of flame....") The rejection slips I got back neither suprised nor dismayed me. In fact, I rather treasured the one that appeared to be signed by Stanley Schmidt his own self.

But then, I'm not a writer.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:53 PM by Bacchus

I laughed so hard, my husband asked me what was so funny and spent the next twenty minutes listening to me read your comments! I'll echo Holly's comment that I feel totally sane and well-adjusted after reading this - that doesn't happen very often. I'm going to have to bookmark this for the time that I actually write something that I'm happy enough to start my own rejection letter collection with.

Posted February 2, 2004 2:57 PM by KimGonzo

I believe that Hustler used to send out squares of toilet paper that said "This ain't the kind of shit we're looking for."

The best rejection letter I ever received was from Sub Pop Records, and began "Dear Loser." It was a form letter, so I didn't take it personally.

What does seem unfair to authors, though, is the (unwritten?) rule that they submit manuscripts to publishers in series rather than in parallel. What's the justification for this practice? The music business seems to manage without it.

Posted February 2, 2004 3:06 PM by Tim Walters

Great article. There is something you may be overlooking, however. Authors get several rejection slips for every work they send out, so they make a relative opinion about rejections in comparison to other rejections they've received.

When a single story nets you one rejection that reads, 'Great story -- I'm sure someone will publish it, but we can't right now', then three form letters, and then one that claims you're a chimpanzee with no grasp of the english language....well, then it's difficult not to lose respect for one or more of the editors involved. Is the 'nice' editor an idiot, or is the 'mean' editor an asshole? Or is the entire profession just messed up? These are the things that go through authors' heads when editors violently disagree.

Posted February 2, 2004 3:07 PM by Remus Shepherd

On the very first submission of my first novel I chose one of Canada's top publishing houses. I eventually received a glowing rejection letter from the Senior Children's Editor. Contrary to the cry-babies I've just read about, I used her recommendations and ended up self-publishing my novel.

I've now self-published three novels in the Autumn Jade Mystery Series and sold more books than the majority of first-time authors who sign on with a name publisher. The editor has since left that publishing house, but I managed to find her and sent an appropriate thank-you letter. It was her kindess and extra effort (in what must be a truly overwhelming job) that encouraged me to keep with it.

If you really believe in your writing, self-publish it! Check out http://www.autumnjade.com to see how it's done.

Posted February 2, 2004 3:16 PM by Steve Whan

Fun and interesting post and discussion.

I've found that a rejection is a rejection, and
the person up-thread who just got a "no" written
on the cover letter actually got just as useful
a rejection as the person who gets more
information. A rejection is only a no.

As an example:
I've received a lot of rejections saying the
story and the writing were terrific, but just
missed the cut off, or that the editor didn't
feel it quite met the feel of the magazine or
imprint and that this editor was sure it would
be accepted elsewhere. This is a way to make
the writer feel better (and maybe the editor
too), but it ultimately fails when the writer
realizes that, well, actually the story is not
publishable and they're really wasting the
paper and postage

Personally, I recognize that my writing is not
yet publishable, but I would never get any feel
for that from the content of my rejections, (it's
not part of the editor's job description) nor
from anyone else who may read or critique a
story.

You can only figure out how publishable your
story is from the volume of rejections, not from
their content or tone. I guess this fits with
Heinlein's edict. Many a new writer has spent
too many hours trying to understand rejections
and what might be written between the lines.

What the begining writer is trying to determine
from the rejection is where in the list of 14
possibilities the story fell, but even if the
list were included in the rejection with the
number circled, it would only tell you what
that editor thought.

(OK, if one of the first few were circled, you
could learn something and maybe stop submitting
until you get some more basics, but how many
people who had one of the first few circled
would believe it anyway?)

Cliff

Posted February 2, 2004 3:24 PM by Cliff Johns

I suppose I was once a slush reader, although I didn't realize it at the time. My then-SO published a small-press literary magazine (fairly well regarded) and I helped him weed his incoming submissions once he got to the "tottering towers" level of behindness. I have never doubted that I could write after that; at least I would never consider letting anyone else see anything I had written that was as bad as 90+% of what we got.

But there are those moments. I got promoted to "fiction editor" for the last issue before he decided to fold it and I got to choose the stories for that issue. There were two that were so perfect and evocative that I still remember them all these years later. One of those authors had moved with no forwarding address and the other had died. They never knew they had been accepted.

MAO

Posted February 2, 2004 3:43 PM by Manny Olds

I first started submitting short-story manuscripts when I was 16. At 16, I knew just enough about the industry to (a) always include a SASE; (b) type and double-space my manuscripts; and (c) not take rejections as an editor's judgement of my personal worth as a human being. Of course I was still disappointed by the form rejection slips I got, but I wasn't crushed to a sobbing pulp, and I was elated by my personal rejection from an editor who asked to see more of my work (though thoroughly disappointed when the magazine disappeared a couple years later). I'm amazed that there are adults out there that lack the sort of extremely basic understanding of the industry that I had as a high school kid. Especially since I was certainly more than willing to wallow in all sorts of other varieties of angst at that age...

If these people ever get published, how on earth are they going to react to bad reviews? Now those are painful.

I wrote a short humor piece about rejection letters a couple of years ago -- it was my first published work ever (appearing in the now sadly defunct Scavenger's Newsletter). It's online on my website now if anyone wants to go read it: http://www.tcinternet.net/users/kritzerburke/naomi/devilsmailbox.htm Gordon Van Gelder liked it enough that he sent me a postcard saying so. I, um, framed the postcard and hung it on the wall of my study. (There are stories about writers wallpapering their studies with their rejection letters. A more depressing exercise, I can't imagine. Wallpapering with ordinary wallpaper is bad enough.)

Posted February 2, 2004 3:50 PM by Naomi Kritzer

1) I am deeply, deeply pained that Jo Walton has four novels published. See, I only own three of them. Time to hit the bookstores...

2) My summer-long stint of interning at Tor was one of the smartest things I ever did in terms of understanding the process and sympathizing with/understanding editors. I agree with whoever said up-thread that more (or was it all?) authors should try it.

3) If I sent out manuscripts to make the rounds, I'd have to keep the rejection letters. They'd serve as a very deep and personal reminder of where I'd already sent a given manuscript, because I am certainly not capable of remembering these things on my own.

Posted February 2, 2004 3:51 PM by Jason

Remus said:

Authors get several rejection slips for every work they send out, so they make a relative opinion about rejections in comparison to other rejections they've received.

This is a good point. Writers' groups suffer from this same disparity of perspective. One member of your group thinks your characters are wonderful, well-drawn, sympathetic and engaging; another claims that character X is a racist cliche' while character Y is a blatant Mary Sue; and the rest of the group is making perfunctory proofreading marks while impatiently waiting to hear nice things about their stories.

After a while you learn to take a sort of mental and emotional average of everybody's comments, and throw out anything that's too extreme.

Posted February 2, 2004 4:01 PM by Holly M.

I had a moment there when I was shocked at your estimates of how many truly terrible manuscripts must be rejected daily, and I was on the verge of thinking "surely there aren't that many people who really submit their dreck in the belief that it has a fair shot at being published."

And then I remembered that we are, after all, on planet Earth, and that such a thing was imminently possible.

Also, I recalled just how many books actually are published which according to your categories should not be (*cough*RobertJordan*coughcough*category #10*cough*). In light of such, it is easy to believe that publishers really DO get plenty of submissions that contain entire sentences in all caps, etc.

Posted February 2, 2004 4:01 PM by Marie Anderson

>What does seem unfair to authors, though, is the
>(unwritten?) rule that they submit manuscripts
>to publishers in series rather than in parallel.
>What's the justification for this practice?

Editor A really, really does not want to deal with a letter coming back the other way saying "Thanks for buying this, but I already sold it to Editor B."

Posted February 2, 2004 4:42 PM by Tony Zbaraschuk

Any writer who hates rejection just needs to spend a year writing ad copy. I've never had a rejection from an editor that was nearly as harsh and painful as client feedback. Marketing flunkies who destroy your ideas over speakerphone while they dawdle over their tri-colored pasta are the cruelist people in cubicleland.

At least editors don't expect your work to do something that stories can't do. Unlike marketeers, who want your short ad to compel billions of folks to buy some crap that they don't want or need. Editors just want to publish something that they think people will buy. If we disagree on that, I do feel disappointment, but I don't feel personal rejection. They didn't like my story, for whatever reason. Generally, if I send something out, it's because I think it succeeds at what I was trying to accomplish. By the time I'm getting the rejections, I'm on to the next story anyway.

Maybe the anger comes from the relationship of the client and the worker. The worker must resent the client, it's the way. You want fries with that?

Posted February 2, 2004 4:48 PM by sean

Sometimes even very *cough* successful writers submit manuscripts with entire sentences in CAPS. Sometimes it even works...but maybe there is some long-term indicator there, after all...

"IT IS NOT HERE."

"Well, if you're referring to plot advancement, then, yeah, I'd have to agree."

"I WILL TAKE NO PART."

"...of what? You'll take no part of Elayne's bath out of the manuscript?"

Posted February 2, 2004 4:55 PM by Skwid

Yet more links for y'all:

Myrtle the Manuscript

Confessions of a Slush Pile Reader

Posted February 2, 2004 5:04 PM by James D. Macdonald

Sean writes:

"Any writer who hates rejection just needs to spend a year writing ad copy. I've never had a rejection from an editor that was nearly as harsh and painful as client feedback."

Huh. Strangely enough, I never have any problem with criticism of my business writing. My feeling about it is that I'm there to deliver what *they* want, not what I think they should want (or I think they should have). I pretty much entirely subsume any ego when I do corporate writing, which I guess is an interesting writing exercise in itself. But it means that if a client has a virulent reaction, I don't take it personally -- I just try to get it closer to what they want.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:04 PM by John Scalzi

I am of course awed by some of the miscomprehensions quoted by Teresa, particularly the writer who took "While your story has some really strong writing, it doesn't fit our needs" as meaning "Our needs preclude really strong writing."

Still, even as someone who's never submitted fiction to a professional market, I find myself sympathizing with some of the hurt feelings here, even as we're being asked to sympathized with the editors who have to make the rejections.

Some of the writers seem especially hurt by the particularly gentle, sympathetic, "it's a good story but ..." letters. What these remind me of is romantic brushoffs of the "Why can't we just be friends?" or "You're a really sweet guy but ..." type. Or, I suppose, the typically male equivalents, "I'm not ready to settle down" or "I need my space."

Posted February 2, 2004 5:06 PM by Simon

Thanks for a great post and a great conversation. I'll be telling all my friends about this one.

The worst rejection I've received in the last year was from a Major Literary Magazine, who crammed my MS into the one-stamp SASE (along with a form rejection letter) and sent it to me with 92 cents postage due. What part of "disposable manuscript" didn't they understand?

A friend of mine, probably in a moment somewhere between the blue form of death from ROF and the didn't grab,hold, work from JJA, has commented that if she ever became a slush editor, she'd buy twelve packs of colored paper, shuffle them, and use them to print rejections, thus forever bewildering the writers, who'd spend countless hours trying to compare and figure out what each color stood for.

I believe Argosy is now doing exactly that.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:09 PM by David D. Levine

I've just been thinking about the similarities between programming and writing in this context. Writers have editors, and gather rejection slips; programmers have testers, and gather bug reports. Neither should be taken personally, because they're not intended as such. In fact, there's a technical term for coders who take bug reports as personal affronts: project managers. (Miaow.)

The 13 reasons for rejection also map roughly to the reasons a tester might have for not accepting a piece of software:

• 1-7: code doesn't compile
• 8-10: code doesn't conform to requirements
• 11-13: code doesn't run fast enough

The software teams that finish their projects and actually ship product are the ones that buckle down and keep working until they get to 14: acceptance. Same with writers.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:19 PM by Martin Sutherland

The way to stop rejection slips hurting is to gather more. Eventually you just feel numb. I've had 28 in the last 12 months and have now attained the happy state of shrug and resubmit.

Shouting 'Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! at the envelope helps.

Slush readers, however, should all be issued with a small monk to stand close by as they plod through the piles. His job is to ignite threads soaked in naphtha while whispering 'Remember John Grisham'*.

JF
*Or 'Watership Down.' Or...

Posted February 2, 2004 5:29 PM by Julian Flood

Editor A really, really does not want to deal with a letter coming back the other way saying "Thanks for buying this, but I already sold it to Editor B."

That doesn't sound like much of an imposition compared to spending months or years finding out if a story or book is publishable, when you could do it in six weeks.

But maybe it's just the difference between publishing and music. A musician makes a greater financial outlay in a demo than a writer does in a manuscript, with less hope of success. The shelf life of a demo is also shorter.

And of course an editor buys more manuscripts in a given time period than a record company signs artists, so the process needs to be more streamlined. Still, if I were a writer, it would bug me.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:30 PM by Tim Walters

I've just been thinking about the similarities between programming and writing in this context.

The levels of rejection don't also map like that - code that merely doesn't compile is at level, well, the levels don't map well at all, but if I were doing 14 levels of code evaluation it'd be around level 7 or so. There are all sorts of nasty things lurking in levels 1-6.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:34 PM by Dan Blum

After reading this, I can name a lot of reasons why your stories are rejected--the SSAE just one of them, attitude another. I don't know one SERIOUS writer who would ever send a submission without an SSAE. It's a lack of respect to omit it, not to mention being a clear indicator of where you are professionally. But hey, if it's working for you...

Posted February 2, 2004 5:35 PM by Serious Writer

He is also said to have rejected a manuscript with "I am in the smallest room of my house, and your manuscript is before me. Soon it shall be behind me."

"I am in the smallest room in my house." etc. is actually from the German composer Max Reger, in response to a negative newspaper review of his music.

I was told that was Voltaire.

6. Author has a moderate neurochemical disorder and can’t tell when he or she has changed the subject. This greatly facilitates composition, but is hard on comprehension.

Gosh, I guess I won't submit my stream-of-consciousness novel from the point of view of a guy with severe ADHD (I was going to call him Marcus Sam). And I was making such progress...I'd almost gotten started.

Seriously, the only time I ever actually submitted something it was to Asimov's, and it got a form letter (I thought a very nice one), saying "Your story was seen by an editor, but either..." [list several of the low-number reasons in Teresa's post] "...or simply did not rise high enough above the level of the other ____ stories we received that month." And "217" was handwritten in.

I, of course, assumed it was that last. But I never submitted it anywhere else, and by then I was bored with the story and didn't rewrite it.

Posted February 2, 2004 5:45 PM by Xopher

This morning's edition of Making Light, reminds me of the relentlessly incisive and entertaining introspection, say, of "Law Day." I hope we can look forward to reading this again, along with other selected entries, in _Making Book 2_. In the meantime, I'll keep the permalink for our old lodge brothers -- for the next time the meme-wheel comes around to: "blogs: all politics and ephemeral chit-chat; fanzines: literate introspection."

Posted February 2, 2004 5:53 PM by Lenny Bailes

Melissa wrote: "It's these lines that got to me:

> I absolutely believe that your children love it, but there is a real difference between a told story and a written one.

This is true, but I can smell a faint whiff of condescension here on the part of the editor. I think it's in the phrase "your children."

> And I am afraid that PRINCE JASON AND THE MAGIC STAR is just too slight and too sentimental to make a successful book.

I'd keep the "slight" but lose the "sentimental." Actually, I would try to find another way to say all of this . . . ."

Melissa, as a one time editor of children's books, I cannot tell how many letters with mss. begin "My children all love this story. . ." or how many relate that it was a told story they insisted get put down on paper. (Almost always badly.)

And probably slight and sentimental are the two bugaboos of children's picture books.

I think the editor did that author a big favor. Not that the author probably saw it that way. But if I had taken time to write to the author, I would probably have said the same thing.

YMMV, obviously.

And I love you, too.

Jane

Posted February 2, 2004 6:42 PM by jane

re Holly M.'s comment, I think part of the problem is that (unless one is part of the Literary Scene, and thus probably published already) the editors are unknowns. In a writer's group, you KNOW that Person A has real issues with strong female characters and Person B gets bored if there isn't an action sequence every ten pages, so you mentally adjust for their criticism.

As a writer, you have no way to know what an editor's preferences and issues are. There's no way to know that the editor who rejected your manuscript is just plain sick of mission-to-Mars stories, no matter how good yours was, or that the name of the main character is the same as his nutbar ex's.

That said, I don't take rejection letters personally unless they ARE personal, e.g. "Your writing sucks, don't quit your day job." After all, if it were personal, I never would have been rejected, being the fabulous and irresistible person I am. ;)

Posted February 2, 2004 6:51 PM by mythago

Peter Watts and I just received a short story rejection from an obviously overloaded and therefore delayed market. The dim background picture on the page is of a girl giving the reader the finger. Supposed to show they have "edge," I guess, but I have to say that and the time they took won't entice either of us to bother with them again.

But that's the end of my bitching, since I've seen a tiny fraction of the crap that Teresa gets to see.

D

Posted February 2, 2004 6:57 PM by Murph

It's odd...I have a friend who actually passes by conditions 1-8 at least, and sometimes 1-10...but who seldom finishes work and submits it for publication. After a recent round of correspondence with her, I found myself reflecting on the why of this. I decided that the unfortunate truth is that many would-be writers are treating submission as part of (sometimes most of) an educational system, and expecting some level of attention from the system.

Posted February 2, 2004 7:10 PM by Randolph Fritz

My favorite rejection slip was a form with about 20 reasons to be checked off as needed. I got "It was too long" but not "It was very bad" or "It was AWFUL". I suppose knowing I wasn't at the worst end of the spectrum was comforting to my teenaged ego.

I still wonder how bad I'd have to be to get "Your enemies, who are constantly plotting against you, have paid us a large sum of money to reject anything you submit."

Posted February 2, 2004 7:10 PM by Karl Gallagher

Great post! Thanks for it.

Quoth Remus:

Is the 'nice' editor an idiot, or is the 'mean' editor an asshole? Or is the entire profession just messed up?

Or none of the above. Editors are just people with fancy titles, after all, and different people are bound to have different opinions on stories. That doesn't have to mean anyone's wrong or nasty or overly charitable. Could be that all this scenario means is that you misread one of your markets. It happens...no big deal.

(Could mean other things, too, of course.)

Posted February 2, 2004 7:18 PM by Hannah Wolf Bowen

The following three points are, I think, inarguable (tho correct me if I'm wrong):

Reading slush largely sucks, and editors are perfectly justified in rejecting the majority of the submissions they receive.

Writing and submitting means you will inevitably receive rejection letters.

Rejection letters aren't fun, even at their best. Some people can shrug them off; others are driven to quitting writing, or even life, altogether. Common advice seems to be that writers need to "toughen up" to learn to live with rejection.

My question (stupid, probably, but I'm used to it): Is a "tougher" writer a better writer?

Posted February 2, 2004 7:46 PM by FranW

The way to get around having your manuscript sit on Publisher A's bookshelf for a year before it gets rejected, thereby freeing it to sit on Publisher B's bookshelf for another year, etc, until by the time it's finally accepted you are too old to tour is by getting an agent.

Agents can submit manuscripts and proposals simultaneously as long as they inform editors that they're doing so.

It's probably at least as hard to get a good agent as it is to get your book accepted by a publisher. But there are many more agents to submit to and their turnaround time is far faster.

Posted February 2, 2004 8:34 PM by Rachel Brown

The lesson I take from all this is that we should turn slush around faster than we do. The wait makes everything too agonizing, and the responses too important.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:08 PM by Teresa Nielsen Hayden

Fran, there are tough cookies who are awful writers, and others who are excellent. One of the most respected writers in the field is as touchy as a bear with a toothache. Fortunately, said writer isn't often in danger of rejection.

We recognize two very rough categories. One are the writers who wouldn't take a hint if it weighed six hundred pounds and were dropped on their collective foot. They're immune to discouragement, along with most other forms of social influence. The other sort will take any hint that could possibly be construed as a comment upon their work, and clutch it to their bosom. The Spartan boy with the fox has nothing on them.

It is impossible to say anything about commercial writing that will get through to the first sort without unjustly frightening and depressing the second sort.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:19 PM by Teresa Nielsen Hayden

What bothered you the most about this letter?

The second sentence, because it inferred that an offer was available

If this is an example of the usage in the manuscript, I can see why it might be rejected.

I'm not any kind of writer, but this whole post makes me feel like finishing up a story or two and sending them out. Heck, I compulsively proofread everything down to cereal boxes. I can write a paragraph that's all about the same thing. Even if my plotting were terrible, I'd at least make it to number 7.

Posted February 2, 2004 9:22 PM by Kylee Peterson

Ah, the "should" factor! But, O Wise and Lovely Hostess....

A: how many mss do you receive in a week? (My guess: 35)

B: how long does it take to log a ms in your records, open it up, read (some of) it, make a decision, find the appropriate rejection (or acceptance) letter, scribble in an encouraging note if appropriate, stick it in the SASE, make a note in the log boook, and put the package back into the ma