Would Your Prefer A Fortune Cookie Rejection?

A reader inspired a final "question of the month" for 2007 with this letter:

I'm kind of upset about a recent form reject from FIVEPOINTS. The submission was targeted -- I actually do read their magazine, I like some of the stories in it, and what I sent was completely targeted to it and highly polished, sent out only after close analysis of what they publish. It was addressed to the editors, went out with a personalized cover letter, and so on. And in return? Well, you'll get more insight out of the paper slip you pull out of a Chinese fortune cookie ... and their cheap slip wasn't all that much bigger. But that gave me an idea, so here goes: My suggestion to them and other journals is to go ahead and run with the "fortune cookie" motif. It's cute, it speaks to their level, it's easy to mass produce, and for serious-but-undiscovered writers it helps take out the vacuity of this whole routine. They don't have to send us the cookies but maybe they should go the extra mile and print "learn Chinese" with a word on the back side, or at least give us a few lucky numbers at the bottom so we won't feel so cheated out of postage and paper and time and feel so trampled from the deal. Maybe they could list the names of a few other journals worth supporting, so we could take the advice and get some more SASEs out in the mail. I mean, I was so incensed by the cheapness and thoughtless of their tiny slip which had been sent in response to what I know is a great and well-written story that I took another close look at my issues and did some googling on the contributors. And as a result I did find out one interesting thing about FIVEPOINTS: as far I can tell every last one of their contributors are either teachers or MFA graduates, so I figure that until I become one of those I won't ever meet the needs of that magazine.

Suppose for a minute you could receive your literary rejection in some form other than an email or a letter (i.e., a cake, singing telegram, melting ice sculpture, or fortune cookie). How would you most like to receive your next rejection?

And The SQ Winners Are...Not You

In case you forgot (in the last couple of days) that you didn't win the SQ contest, this follow up congratulatory email came in to the rejected:

StoryQuarterly
congratulates the winners and finalists
in the Fall 2007 SQ Fiction Contest
First Place ($2500)
Ree Davis — Watermark
Second Place ($1500)
Edan Lepucki — Animals
Third Place ($750)
Josh Weil — The Last Thing You Need
Ten Finalists ($100 each)
Elizabeth Bloom Albert — Do You Have a Name?
Wesley Brown — Too Young for the Blues
Kay Eldredge — Thinking It Through
Alicia Gifford — Wreckers
Elaine Kim — Sunshine
R. S. Koya — The Royal Abduls
Michelle Lee — Speaking After Rain
Hannah Pittard — The Year Helen Turned Forty-One
Judith Slater — The Time of Plenty
Michael Wolff — The Complaint
The new StoryQuarterly Love Story Contest,
will be accepting both fiction and nonfiction,
and will run from January 1 to March 31, 2008.
For details, please see
StoryQuarterly.com

A Rejection Falls Between the Stalls

A published author sent in this amaaaaazing rejection for a novel that eventually got rewritten and published. Check out the last line of the first paragraph below: "If only you'd bloody well write something people would want to read." WTF?

Dear Writer,

[Title of Novel] is very well written, moving, funny, distressing, provoking, and so very, very dark you’d want to top yourself. [Name of Protagonist] has a great voice, though she also seems extraordinarily perceptive and articulate for a [young aged person]. And how does she know what’s going on with [Name of Different Character] [Details of Specific Situation and Page Numbers]? The difficulty with first-person narration is the narrator can’t be everywhere at once. Yet despite all these compliments, I don’t think I could sell this one either. It’s not fair, is it (but what is)? A good writer, which you are, with a good story and a good voice to tell it in, should be able to find a publisher – but I can’t think who I’d approach. I could say it falls between the stalls of literary and commercial fiction, but that would be a cop-out. I suggest you try other agents – publishing is a totally subjective business, and I’ve been wrong before – and don’t lose heart. If only you’d bloody well write something that people would want to read without resort to the bottle or the noose!

I’m sorry, really. A second time.

All the best, [Name of Agent Withheld]

Thank you, fine published author, for sending this rejection in and giving us all a little hope and good cheer for 2008! We all really want to read your book.

Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, Happy Rejection

I submitted two stories to StoryQuarterly's contest and got back two identical rejections in yesterday's mail. They go like this:

Dear Writer, Rejected
Thank you for entering “Title of Story” in the StoryQuarterly Fiction Contest. The piece was read and carefully considered by several of our editors, in a competition made challenging by the number of entries we received and by there being so many, like yours, that deserved particularly close attention, based on the positive responses of the editors. In the end, we could choose only a handful of stories, however, and hard choices had to be made, and we regret that your story was not one of our winners this time. We’re grateful for your participation in the contest, and we hope you will keep StoryQuarterly in mind for your work in the future. An announcement of the winning stories will soon go out to the magazine’s readership, along with a schedule of open reading periods and future contests. Again, thank you for sending your work, and please accept our kind wishes for a wonderful holiday and a fulfilling New Year.

Sincerely,

The Editors

StoryQuarterly.com

Dear Writer, Rejected

Thank you for entering “Title of Story” in the StoryQuarterly Fiction Contest. The piece was read and carefully considered by several of our editors, in a competition made challenging by the number of entries we received and by there being so many, like yours, that deserved particularly close attention, based on the positive responses of the editors. In the end, we could choose only a handful of stories, however, and hard choices had to be made, and we regret that your story was not one of our winners this time. We’re grateful for your participation in the contest, and we hope you will keep StoryQuarterly in mind for your work in the future. An announcement of the winning stories will soon go out to the magazine’s readership, along with a schedule of open reading periods and future contests. Again, thank you for sending your work, and please accept our kind wishes for a wonderful holiday and a fulfilling New Year.
Sincerely,
The Editors
StoryQuarterly.com

The Term that Launched a Thousand Rejections (Not)

Here's a little Christmas present that was waiting for me in my mail box today from a reader, extolling the wisdom of blogging agent Kristen Nelson. Here's what the note says:

FYI, You write: I am a published, award-winning author of fiction and creative nonfiction

Kristen Nelson at Pub Rants writes: "Several attendees posed a question about their 'creative nonfiction' work. This, of course, puzzled the agents and editors sitting on the panel. Why? Because there is no such genre as creative nonfiction. All nonfiction (and fiction for that matter) is creative by nature so calling something 'creative nonfiction' doesn’t really define it. And then I remembered. This is a term often used by universities and writing programs but in publishing, we don’t use it. If you are writing a memoir, it’s called a memoir. If you are writing a collection of essays, it’s called a collection of essays.If you are writing a prescriptive nonfiction self-help book, then that’s what you call it. No agent will ever call and editor and say, 'Yo Jane, I’ve got a creative nonfiction project to send your way.' So I would exorcise this term from your writing/publishing vocabulary (and if you head a writing program, see if you can get that terminology changed). It’s actually a disservice to writers trying to break into the publishing world. Now, don’t worry. It’s not like I’m going to delete every query that uses it but it will raise an eyebrow and show you up as a novice right when you are trying to demonstrate your savvy and professionalism."

It apears that Nelson has never heard of the most prestigious nonfiction journal around, which is entitled, hello, Creative Nonfiction. (Incidentally, I am proud to report that I have had the good grace to be chosen for publication by Lee Gutkind and the editors at CN.) I also will continue to call my nonfiction work creative because I think the above reasoning is ridiculous puffery used to fill up a blog. BTW, I very much doubt that the term "creative nonfiction" has ever been responsible for any of my esteemed rejections. (Raise an eyebrow all you want: me no care.)

Under the Christmas Tree for You!

Here's a little present for you from Gertrude Stein. Hang it on your bulletin board and repeat it to anyone who questions why you are indignant about getting rejected:

"It is a very strange feeling when one is loving a clock that is to every one of your class of living an ugly and a foolish one and one really likes such a thing and likes it very much and liking it is a serious thing, or one likes a colored handkerchief that is very gay and every one of your kind of living thinks it a very ugly or a foolish thing and thinks you like it because it is a funny thing to like it and you like it with a serious feeling, or you like eating something and liking it is a childish thing to every one or your like something that is a dirty thing and no one can really like that thing or you write a book and while you write it you are ashamed, you know you will be laughed at or pitied by every one and you have a queer feeling and you are not very certain and you go on writing. Then some one says yes to it, to something you are liking, or doing or making and then never again can you have completely such a feeling of being afraid and ashamed that you had then when you were writing or liking the thing and not any one had said yes about the thing.”*

May you each get a Literary Yes (or two) wrapped up this season to wash away all writerly fear and shame.

*As quoted in Two Lives by Janet Malcolm (Yale University Press, 2007)

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas, all you writers out there. May all your publishing wishes come true.

Merry Christmas, Rosemary Ahern.

Fantasy Literary Letter #5

Dear Rosemary Ahern:

Flannery said, "The writer operates at a peculiar crossroads where time and place and eternity somehow meet. His problem is to find that location. " Today, while writing what I know will be the last and most triumphant revision of my novel, I found it. I found the location. Meet me there?

Sincerely,

Writer, Rejected

The Ghost of Christmas Past (Not Enough Detail)

A reader sent in an excerpt from this strange agent rejection:

"Dear Writer: We loved this idea, and we found it very fresh and charming. We were eager to dive into your work! We liked the double narrative from [name of character] and [name of different character], and we think you really structured your story well.

....Unfortunately, we didn't feel like there was enough descriptive detail about [specific topic addressed in novel] past here – the glamour days of [place addressed in the novel] didn't really come alive for us on the page. Since this recreation of the past is crucial to the storyline, we felt that without it, we weren't as caught up in your characters and their lives as we wanted to be."

They love, love, love it.....but not enough. Note the hairpin turn at "unfortunately." Damn the past and its lack of details! Also, what's with the royal we? That's a whole lot of douchery.

Classically DeLISHious

Novelist Rhian Ellis (After Life: A Novel [Penguin, 2001]) over at the delightful blog Ward Six posted the above fabulous rejection from Gordy Lish. Hop on over to the Ward and read a little more about it. Ellis' post is entitled Raymond Carver and Gordon Lish (and Me). I like the homespun feel and earnest wordiness of Lish's rejection. Feels like he doesn't ever want you to give up on him or Quarterly, which you've just got to love. "This magazine is wide open -- to everyone and everything. It only remains for you to teach us who's who and what's what." Also: "A fact or three." Something warmly genuine about this one. A good old blast from the past.

Writing Rejection = Marriage Depression

Check out Daniel Clay's article entitled "Coping with Rejection" over at 5th Estate. It's interesting in a British way. For instance, his first line is "Rejection is part of being a writer the same way depression is part of being married." Last line: "Write what you believe in and what you care about, and take your pleasure from writing rather than how your writing is received. You might only be pleasing yourself if you follow this outlook – but at least you’ll be pleasing someone."

Thoughts 0n this piece anyone?

'Tis the Season

Oh the joy of being hit up for a holiday subscription by the very folks who rejected you!

Prairie Schooner will sell me the short story collection that beat mine out and a subscription for just $32. See the pretty snowy art work? I guess you can't blame a smal press for trying. I don't even mind being called "Gentle Reader," which if truth be told is an apt description of my approach toward books and fellow authors. But I do not like being referred to as a "Friend of All-Story," which I am not. Something about the Zoetrope attitude really bugs me, even during this lovely time of year.

Somberg's Dating Service?

A reader sent this rejection in from Andrea Somberg at Harvey Klinger Agency, saying she found it kind of amusing: "Dear Writer: Thanks for sending along the opening pages of [title of novel]. Truth be told, though, I'm afraid they didn't draw me in as much as I had hoped. I'm pressed for time these days and, what with my reservations about the project, I suspect I wouldn't be the best fit. Thanks so much for contacting me, though, and for giving me this opportunity. It's much appreciated, and I'm sorry to be passing. I wish you the very best of luck in your search for representation. Best, Andrea"

I thought it seemed pretty standard, so I asked why the writer thought it was funny. Here's what she said: I thought it was funny because of how the novel didn't grab her in the way she had hoped it would. She didn't get a ton of pages, so it was like meeting someone on-line: "Oh I thought you were going to be different. Sorry my mistake." The writer goes on to tell this related story: I once had a guy I was interviewing tell me he expected me to be a knock-out because of my voice on the phone. When he met me in person he told me that I wasn't as attractive as he expected me to be. I think the rejection amused me in the same way.

Mclean's Idiot SavAgency

This is a rejection letter from Laurie McLean, an agent with Michael Larsen and Elizabeth Pomada at an agency they call Agent Savant, or maybe that's the name of Laurie's blog. I don't know. Anyway, this letter is so incredible that I think I will let it speak for itself (with thanks and condolences to the reader who sent it to me):

"Dear Writer: Thank you for sharing your work with me. I know that writing a book is a time-consuming and emotional process, so I appreciate the effort you have expended to reach this point in your publishing journey. Alas, I must reject what you have been kind enough to submit. Like the rest of the arts, publishing is a very subjective business. Even though the founders of the agency have written or coauthored 14 books, most of which have been successful, they still get rejected. And although we have sold books to more than 100 publishers since 1972, our clients' work is still rejected. Nor do all of the books that we sell succeed. Michael, Elizabeth and I are eager to find new books and writers, and we love to get excited about them. But the only way we can make a living is by selling books to the large and medium-sized New York publishers, and selling small books by new writers to big publishers is becoming more difficult. So finding new writers is the hardest part of our job. And it's getting harder. Like editors, we receive thousands of submissions a year and reject more than ninety percent of them. This forces us to use a form letter. But rejecting manuscripts that become successful books is a publishing tradition. Assume we're wrong. Persevere until your books reach the goals you set for them. I can't suggest a publisher or an agent who might be interested in a particular writer's work, but directories, your publishing network, and the Association of Authors' Representatives might lead you to the agent you need. Persistence rewards talent. I can't make a living saying no, but as author Joe Girard says: 'Every no gets you closer to yes.'"

Why is she quoting Joe Girard? "Every no gets you closer to yes?" Does she think we are cheesey motivational salesmen? One word: pukey.

Stoli with a Twist

A reader sent this Sam Stoloff rejection to LROD for posting. I believe this is a form query rejection, and I think Sam does a very nice job of making a routine response sound personable and individualized.

"Dear Writer: Thank you very much for your query, and my apologies for having taken so long to get back to you. I'm afraid that, although under other circumstances I might want to take a look at some of your work, I am swamped with submissions and current commitments at the moment, and so I'm simply not able to consider your project right now. However, I do appreciate the opportunity to consider your writing, and wish you success in finding the right person to represent your literary interests. Sincerely, Sam Stoloff"

Note how politely tentative he is: he might want to look at some of your work under other circumstances. But he is swamped and overcommitted. In the end, you kind of feel sorry for him that he's not going to get to read your amazing novel. Now, that is really quite classy and brilliant. Well played, Mr. Stoloff. I wouldn't mind seeing one of your more personalized rejections. Can any one help out on that?