abracanabra | Entries tagged with rejection

Man, being a new mom just changes how I perceive everything. In breastfeeding, the term "latching on" is used to refer to the process of getting a baby to open its mouth wide, latch on to the breast like a little lamprey, and go om-nom-nom.

So when an editor says that the reason she rejected a story is because she lacked a character to "latch on to"...I picture an editor wandering through storyland, mouth opening and closing like a hungry baby, looking for an appropriately breasted character. Snorfl.

01/26/2010, Tuesday, half day at day job
* Processed 3 crits of "Old Woman By The Sea"
* Processed Null Immortalis' form letter rejection of "Demons of Disease." I don't win 'em all, kids, not by a long shot!
* Posted writing log, freewriting, NanoWri
* Finished redmarking Vicesteed ch. 25.

12/05/2009 - Saturday, spent most of the day on day job stuff
* http://talktoyouniverse.blogspot.com/2008/09/show-dont-tell-exposed.html
* Top Ten Reasons Your Editor Doesn't Love What Your Critique Group Does: http://edittorrent.blogspot.com/2009/11/top-ten-reasons-editor-doesnt-love-what.html

12/03/2009 - Thursday, no day job
* NanoWriMo
* Posted writing log.
* Penthius freewriting about voodoo and slavery and--pirates. Am confused.
* Processed "A Phoenix By Any Other Name" acceptance by Short-Story.me!
* Processed "These Things Take Time" form letter rejection by New Myths.
* Processed "Charity From a Thief" personal rejection (with specific editorial feedback!) from Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Will be making edits to use feedback before submitting story elsewhere.
* Processed "Road of Dreams" personal rejection from Screams and Dreams Anthology and editor's proposed non-paying acceptance from Liquid Imagination. (I'll try paying markets first, though I do like the way they mesh art and writing--it's always awesome to see what art people think goes with my stories.)

12/02/2009 - Wednesday, full day at job
* Read Writer's Digest newsletter.
* NanoWriMo--getting to redescribing the bit from Vicesteed.
* Penthius freewriting.

12/01/2009 - Tuesday, no job
* Posted writing log.
* Penthius freewriting
* Wrote NanoWriMo. November may be over, but the story isn't. I'll keep going until it's done.
* Red-marked Vicesteed ch. 22
* Processed Fantasy Magazine's personal and remarkably speedy "very close, but not quite" rejection of "Haunts of Hill Crossing."

Cumulative and boring. I've been busy with work stuff and haven't gotten much done a-tall. Except for Friday.

9/3/2009 - Thursday
* Added joining Broad Universe to me "To Do Once Pro" file. Yes, I have a file. It's where I keep my stratagems.
* Processed personal "Caught out attention, but--" rejection of "Charity From a Thief" by Heroic Fantasy Quarterly.

9/2/2009 - Wednesday
* Ken Schneyer's Clarion reports: http://ken-schneyer.livejournal.com/18265.html. For writing tips, check out the "Week Three Report" as well as the "Some Writing Wisdom..."
* Posted part 3 of my CONvergence panel notes, this time with pictures.

9/1/2009 - Tuesday
* Posted request for volunteers to crit, "Missing You in Pieces." (No takers.)

08/28/2009 - Friday
* Finished "Missing You In Pieces"--and I absolutely agree with

yuki_onna that there ought to be confetti and kazoos when a piece is finished. And applause. (Perhaps confetti only for novels.) Seems like there ought to be a device one could create to do that. (Wasn't there a web page somewhere on the internets that had a big red button that, when pushed, produced applause?)

08/27/2009 - Thursday
* Posted writing log.
* Penthius freewriting about a girl kidnapped and found two decades later.

08:23 -- Ugh. Got a nosebleed while at work. Charming. And my skin is turning super-dry. Yup, winter's coming.
08:24 Seriously wondering how long NgithOwl will pay the 2 of us to sit here and *not work*.
09:40 Guinness Beef Stew -- Now that's a recipe I need to try. ping.fm/93p0F
09:42 ++ Got email from boss about project I need to go in to NgithOwl to work on--but not until tomorrow.
17:21 Sigh. Got "well received by our submissions staff" rejection.

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08/10/2008 - Sunday, no work
* Posted writing log
*

penthius freewriting, a really neat magic realism take on Ukrainian Easter eggs.
* Typed up the story idea Phil mused for me and deposited a placeholder in penthius.
* Updated market list from Critters, Ralan newsletter, and notes I've left myself.
* Then the internets were cranky, so instead of my usual Sunday work, I did a few more pages of redmarking Vicesteed.
* Processed "Dining on a Dead Girl's Dime" non-win of Weird Tales spam-inspired story contest.
* Processed crit of "And the Dog Died." Oops. Yeah, I guess I only explained some parts in my own mind.
* Processed Les Bonnes Fees personal rejection of "The Radiator Burped" - "not quite right for us. Of course, I can't really tell you what is right for us, because I don't know until I see it. That said, your work is wonderful, and I'd love to see more." Moderately encouraging.

08/11/2008 - Monday, 1/2 work at IDS, but saw movie in the PM instead of writing.
* Read FFW Small Markets, FundforWriters newsletters
* Downloaded files to crit from TCSFWNetc and posted my intro. Maybe I should have done that *before* putting my story up for critique!
* Started doing crit of "The Delivery" for writers group.
* Processed

todfox's crit of "And the Dog Died"

06/26/2008 - Thursday, half work at NgithOwl, but then I came home and fell asleep on the kitchen floor instead of writing
* Read newsletters: FFWSmallMarkets - got some market ideas for CSA-based nonfic articles; FundsforWriters; Critters; and WritersWeekly.
* Processed Ballista's personal rejection of "Demons of Disease" - enjoyed it, but aren't taking it.
* Processed Vulgata's personal rejection of "Passings" - useful critical feedback on how to take this wisp of a story and maybe put some meat on its bones. Not sure if it's worth it. Pondering.
* Processed Clarkesworld's personal rejection of "Road of Dreams" - harsh but fair criticism.
* Processed Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show's form rejection of "Waiting" (reprint).
* Processed Misfits Writing Contest not-win of "The Haunts of Hill Crossing" - announcement of winners.
Yes, I've been letting my submissions get backlogged. Now to get out the 16 stories and 1 novel that have "submit" or "submit reprint" as their status. Eep.
* Processed

mischief03's crit of Vicesteed ch. 11-12.

06/25/2008 - Wednesday, half work at IDS
At "work":
* Wrangled new lj friends from 4th Street Fantasy con.
* Wrote up a significant portion of my notes from 4th Street.
Home:
* Tried to organize a bit for CONvergence.
* Penthius freewriting, high-potential "Buttermilk Pancakes, Side of Prophecy"
* Finished writing up notes from 4th Street. That took a lot longer than I was expecting, but just going over them made my brain start fizzing again, a bit.

06/24/2008 - Tuesday, half work at NgithOwl
* Penthius freewriting, a neat character setup that could go any number of ways.
* Posted writing log.
* Did three more critiques for Critters. Finished! Hooray! I have once again pulled up my critique ratio just in time to get my manuscript out as scheduled. And most of the stories were enjoyable to read, which was a nice bonus.

Sunday, no work
*

penthius freewriting, a high-potential idea for linked short stories.
* Posted writing log.
* Processed Cemetary Dance's form rejection of "Good Help is Hard to Find"
* Processed Allegory's form rejection of "The Perfect Costume" (reprint)
* Processed GUD's "shows promise" rejection of "Charity From a Thief"
* Read 2 FundsforWriters, AbsoluteWrite, WritersWeekly, FFWSmallMarkets newsletters
* Read and responded to Baen's Bar comments on "The Unkindness of Ravens." Among other things, kept self from bitch-slapping negative commenter who I suspect was trying to make the competition look bad.
* Submitted "Charity From a Thief" to Weird Tales.
* Updated submission order list for "Miracle Material"

05/25/2008 - Sunday, no work
*

penthius freewriting - a trite little framework about wannabe colonists forced to live in the slums of their new home.
* Transferred new revision of "The Unkindness of Ravens" to desktop computer, changed status in spreadsheets.
* Processed new status of "Salvaging Scottwell" FKA "Police Bot"
* Processed Fictitious Force's rejection of "The Radiator Burped."
* Added "steampunk" to my definition of Vicesteed on the various places that I talk about it. Just a small change, but keywords and tags are important, and I can't think why I didn't change it before. Also, I totally need to create a document wherein I track the various places I need to change/update my writing info when such changes occur--a new project, a new publication, etc.
* Printed off Critters crits of Vicesteed Ch. 13.
* Sent one repeating critter Chapter 14 of Vicesteed for editing.
* Updated Vicesteed rough chapter summaries and submitted Chapter 14 into the Critters queue, where it will eventually bubble up to the top.

05/24/2008 - Saturday, no work
* Updated OpenOffice on laptop.
* Went through and marked up "Salvaging Scottwell" for edits again, using

douglascole's notes for part of it. That story rocks on toast. It will be even more awesome once I finish these edits. Robots! Adaptive programming! Ghetto uprising! Beating the man at his own game! Gah! I want it to succeed so much that just thinking about its future gives me butterflies. Right now I have three stories that I'm really proud of, and none of them are out there yet: "Ice Mother," "Salvaging Scottwell," and "The Unkindness of Ravens" (which was out there but had been recalled for further edits).
* Finished making editing changes to "The Unkindness of Ravens." Hope I've fixed the bad beginning, but am not sure it's actually good yet. At least it doesn't involve flashbacks!

05/23/2008 - Friday, full+ work at NgithOwl
Read WritersDigest newsletter - excellent article listing 101 best sites for writers (http://writersdigest.com/101BestSites). Created syndicated livejournal feeds for a couple of the winning blogs that I found to be interesting--

bransford and

lperkinsagent. Also started following another agent blog that already has a livejournal,

arcaedia.

Friday, 10/13/2006 - full day (+ some) doing NightOwl coding, home and there
*

penthius freewriting - The Princess That Wasn't, a high-potential fairytale-twisting notion about a prince being raised as a princess to subvert a curse.

* Finished reading Writing-World.com newsletter. Of particular interest to me was an article about podcasting that's a good basic overview with some useful links and suggestions.

* Processed agent rejection letter from the A-grade Trident Media Group--a nice personalized rejection from the agent's assistant. Waiting to hear back from one more agent in the A group--quite hoping this one will like it, as not only do I love the description of the agent who might be interested in my type of writing (Please??), but one of the other agents went to my high school in India, Woodstock, so I feel I've a bit of a personal connection to the firm, though I didn't mention it (sadly, this other agent doesn't rep my type of writing, so it didn't figure in). Nice to see other alumni doing well, though. I find the success of others I know or am connected to in some way to be encouraging, despite the occasional random pang of envy (

scott_lynch!). 'Cause, y'know, they're real people and they did it, and I'm a real person, so I can do it...or something like that.

* Coincidentally, had just participated in a discussion on

specficmarkets on the relative merits of solicited and agented work being presented to publication houses--now realize was sort of saying that my own work wasn't as good.... Nope! My own work is brilliant, or at least competently written and interestingly plotted, and by God, I will get an agent and many, many published novels, and a membership in SFWA. One day.

"The Unkindness of Ravens" was not accepted for the anthology I submitted it to. Excuse me while I bawl my eyes out.* I thought it was a really good story. Everybody who saw it thought it was a pretty good story...and that was rough draft. To make matters worse, it's nearly 16,000 words long, which makes it damn near unsellable to most markets.

Some days, being a writer means feeling like you're down and being kicked repeatedly in the ribs.**

Is okay. I have rhinoceros hide when it comes to my writing, and I've only worn through about half of it. I'll do my damnedest to sell "The Unkindness of Ravens" elsewhere, and if all else fails, I'll pimp it out for nothing more than a P.O.D copy. None of my babies get to sneak away and die quietly.

* Don't worry, my eyes are actually perfectly dry.
** Nope, that was practicing techniques in Tae Soo Do last night.

Work periods completed: 3
Time began: 9:30 a.m.
Tasks accomplished:
* checked two new markets from

specficmarkets
* made editing changes to "Ice Mother," incidentally shortening it from 7942 words to 6641.
* received form-letter rejection with invite to submit again from Aberrant Dreams for "Blood for Oil"
* e-mailed "Ice Mother" off to my lovely, wonderful volunteers for critiquing.

The Unkindness of Ravens

4,138 / 7,000
(59.1%)

Words yesterday: 1,276
Total words: 4,138
Reason for length: Lost the urge to write.
Overused word: eye
Gratuitous word: aplomb
Type of scene: Escape from a battlefield, followed by fever dreams.
Challenge(s): Again with the working in of background information.
Which line is it anyways? "Danger Three," she said, as softly as if she was a priest instructing him, "beware trusting the raven, for he will strike without mercy to destroy his opponent, even unto pecking out the eyes of fledglings."
Other writingy stuff: Heard that Serenade of Blood & Silver was rejected.
Notes: Got the form letter rejection in the mail today. It's interesting, knowing what went into the rejection process and seeing the extremely impersonal form-letter result.

So, way back in February of 2005, I submitted Serenade of Blood & Silver to a contest being run by Wizards of the Coast. The goal was to select a few novels to launch their new imprint line. Then I sat on my hands for a long, long time (one of the key skills required to be a writer).

I just found out that I did not get passed into the next round, though mine was one of the (relatively few) manuscripts held back for further consideration, which is a small part of why it took so long for me to hear back. So basically I was a semi- semi-finalist. Unfortunately, that does not do much good put on a writerly resume.

Well, at least the contest got it in shape to submit out elsewhere, and I am encouraged that it got as far as it did.

Things this means: I've got to start looking at other publishers, I'm not getting a tattoo anytime soon, and my next novel-length writing project will be something entirely new, instead of the sequel.

Dang it, now I've got to start submitting it to other publishers, assess the agents listed at Preditors and Editors, and so forth. . . . That whole process is just a pain in the ass.

P.S. I promise I won't be depressed for more than a couple of days, and I'm still working full-steam on other projects.

Current Mood: depressed for < 48 hrs
Current Music: Conjure One

Ok, this rejection from Son and Foe made me laugh:

Thank you for thinking of us, but we are going to give your submission a pass.

A personal pass.

Unfortunately, we're rather behind at the moment. So consider this form rejection extra-special: it means we really liked your story, and hope to see more from you in the future.

Thanks again,
Jeremiah Sturgill
Editor, Son and Foe

So cute.

devilstears posted about having four hundred broken hearts on her desk to mail out. This was my response. I'm reposting it so that I can reference it later.

Not broken. Not if they're any kind of writer. A rejection is, at most, getting the wind knocked out of you when you're sparring. You double over, force breathing until it's natural again, and go back to sparring. Walking out of the ring isn't an option, and the only way to become a good fighter, maybe even a champion, is to keep entering that ring.

I expect a blow to the solar plexus in the mail any day now.

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On latching.

Writing Log: Rejectiony

Writing Logs: Processing... Processing....

Writing Log: Miscellaneous

Writing Logs, Cumulative

Details of the Day

Writing Log

Writing Logs

Writing Log

Writing Logs for a few days

Writing Log--Need to Find Good Agent-Bait to Put in Mantraps

Poor "Unkindness of Ravens"

Writing Log...Note the Lack of Actual Writing

Never Trust a Raven--or a Fever Dream

11-Month Rejection Leads Writer to Drink

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