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Monday, August 29, 2011

Form Letters that Raise Hopes (For A Little While)


 Dear -------, Thank you for sending your manuscript "XXXXXX," number ---- to us here at Crazyhorse via the online submission manager. Ultimately, the manuscript was not selected for publication, but we want you to know that we very much enjoyed reading your work. The manuscript was one of the best we've read recently. It was difficult to say no. We hope you will send us another manuscript to consider soon. Since we enjoyed this one, we hope to read more and to give your next manuscript our highest consideration. Yours, The Editors

[Comment by the receiver of this rejection: "I'm thick-skinned, but this one that was emailed on Saturday really got to me. I'm still at the stage of my career where I judge my successes by the quality of my failures-- and this was really just so unbelievable. When I first saw it, and for a half hour thereafter, I felt elated. And then I just got depressed. I couldn't write for maybe twelve hours. I just kept berating myself-- which is silly, no?-- but when you're butting your head against a brick wall, it's your head that suffers most."]


3 comments:

Radek said...

speaking of rejection lets forget about and talk about acceptance.

http://www.duotrope.com/market_6244.aspx

my blog is on duotrope today and ready to give voice to voices less

And thank you writers reject for allowing to post comments

caps man said...

crazyhorse has forever disgusted me through combining rejections for the contest (fifteen or twenty bucks) and regular submissions. that kind of lazy editorial style will sink a journal eventually.

Native Ink said...

That's a good rejection, if there ever was such a thing. Some editors want to see 2 or 3 very solid stories from a new writer before they'll bite. Keep trying them.