I received my 3rd short story rejection of 2009 today (but who's counting) and I'm glad. No, I haven't got a temperature. It was one of those personal rejections that inspires you to have another look at the story and to do some editing. I am very happy with the results, the story is stronger and I've added it to my list of favourites*. I've also cheated. My plan was to write a story to sub to Necrotic Tissue this week. I've completed the first draft of something that has a lot of "but why does that happen?" questions that I don't know all the answers to yet, so I sent my revised story to them instead just in case the 'something' ends up in the recycle bin. I also changed the name of it from the hideous 'Dwelling' (what possessed me) to 'The Scratch of an Old Record'.
*Being on the list of favourites is not a good thing - they never sell. In my opinion the best stories I wrote last year were Frog & the Mail Order Bride, Treading the Regolith, Manipulating Paper Birds, Chasing Alice out of Wonderland and Strange Tooth, and they're all stuck in submission land. While some I was a little unsure of sold right away. Moral of the day: Don't trust you're own judgement.
18 comments:
My favorite story of last year, "Capturing Life", has been rejected about five times.
It's weird. Or bad luck. Or we don't know what we're doing. :)
Ah, "Misplaced Enthusiasm." Will anyone ever like you?
My favorite story, one that started its submissions run with a glowing "last round" rejection from Shimmer last February, still hasn't sold.
I still love you, "Aunt Tessie's Burden"...
LOL! Maybe one day they'll all appear in an anthology together. :)
My absolute favorite story, Faith & Lies, has been rejected so many times, it should just get trunked. But I can't. I love it.
I just got a rejection (number 2 for the year) of a story that I adore. I can't let it go and I can't find a home for it.
Tell me about it. I have several stories that I really love, and can I find a home for them? Maybe the feeling is mutual and they can't bear to contemplate life away from me.
Ooh, I like the title "The Scratch of an Old Record." I wanna sub something to them as well, but my horror bone seems to be broken.
One of my favorite stories (the honking long "Never Be Alone") keeps racking up rejections too. But I'll keep trying, although I'm running out of markets. Good luck for your stories!
Too Late the Rain is my all time favourite and has made the second round on market consideration twice without making the final hurdle.
I'll find it a home one day. Maybe the class of 52 Stitches 09 could put together another anthology next year of unpublished favourites...
Nice rejection is an oxymoron to everyone - but writers ;)
Good job.
"Scratch of an Old Record" is a great title.
I love the idea of an anthology of oft rejected stories. My most frequently rejected favorites are "Horse Latitudes" and "Trail of the Brujo".
Fabulous titles, all of them. I hate you, but in an admiring way.
On my livejournal blog, Gustavo Bondoni commented that perhaps our favourites keep getting rejected because we send them to the toughest markets. Sounds like a very good point.
“Don’t trust your own judgement.” Good advice! But I still maintain: you are the queen of titles.
Most of the stories I think are good sit on the shelf as well after tons of rejections (many of which assure me that they're actually good). I think just trying to find the right story for a publication for that particular issue is usually the major challenge to overcome. As for titles...yeah, I usually suck at those.
Congrats on the personal rejection...they are about as hard to come by as a "yes, we want to print your story"...they can be helpful and you're a step above the rest...enjoy...grin...
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