You're Not Actually Unpublishable (WTF?)
From an anonymous reader, whose work was too good for this journal...obviously. "Hi [First Name of Writer]: Unfortunately we've decided not to include your story in this issue of The Incongruous Quarterly. We all liked it - you're a good writer, and you've got a great way with detail. The eventual consensus among the editors, however, was that it's not actually unpublishable. The weird nature of our mandate means that if we think your story could find a home somewhere else then it doesn't really need us, which was what ended up happening with your piece. Thank you for thinking of us, though, and we'd love to see more work from you in the future. Emma Healey, Editor-In-Chief, The Incongruous Quarterly."
6 comments:
What?! Tell me this is a joke. If if isn't, that poor author must be completely bewildered. Did the editor even read her response before sending it? Yikes.
What a strange rejection! "You're too good for us" is essentially what they're saying. I can't help but think that perhaps the submitter should feel relieved to have been knocked back.
I know this journal--it's The Passive-Aggressive Quarterly.
No joke. It's market for underpublished Canadian writers. A friend also got a 'you're just too good' rejection. We sent each other bitterly sarcastic tweets until we felt better.
That is just ridiculous! People have to stop thinking that the "you're too good" excuse is a proper way to dismiss someone. It's a fail because everyone knows it's not honest. =.= Sadness.
http://www.cbc.ca/books/MT/2010/07/pasha-malla-lost-in-novel-land.html
"It's for stuff that's been rejected other places for whatever reason. It's incongruous in the world of publishing. I've made my fiction selections. It was really hard because all this stuff was really good that they sent me but it was figuring out what was the stuff that really could not get published anywhere else. I was rejecting stuff that was too publishable. It was a funny position to be in." (Pasha Malla, fiction section guest editor, bolding mine.)
...just sayin'. I don't just toss off statements like that - there's a method and mandate at work, and we do everything we can to make sure people know what those things are before they submit.
Sorry to barge in/be all thin-skinned; just wanted to stick up for myself a little bit. Skulking back into the shadows now.
-Emma Healey
Editor-In-Chief, the Passive-Aggressive Quarterly
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