Everything from:rejected

In which there are Historic Moments in the Life of Clairification, Professional Writer

I haven’t posted for a while because I’ve been out of town: four trips in six weeks, making for a very dense and colourful summer.  Most of my writing time has been in airports. Why have I been travelling, you ask?  Mostly family stuff, but some important writing stuff: Readercon.  I flew down with Leah Bobet and Gemma Files–a veritable convoy of Canadian talent.  This was my third time attending, and some things have begun to feel like traditions (the Viable Paradise Saturday night dinner at Redbones, the greasy spoon breakfast with Chang and Marko).  Other things were shiny and new, particularly the Outer Alliance meetup, at which I experienced a spontaneous and utterly thrilling occurrence–I got to sign people’s copies of Beyond Binary.  Photo by Julia Rios: Expect to see me on panels this coming year, assuming the con programming committee wants me–I think I am ready to start speaking as well as listening. The other recent writing benchmark was not so positive: for the first time, I reached double-digit rejections on a single story, which at the time of this post has still not been sold.  For comparison, one of my most successful stories has two sales and […]

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Epic Rejection

The rejection from Apex was concise and polite, and ended with an encouraging invitation to submit more work. In short, the kind of rejection I usually receive. So what made it epic? Maybe the fact that while I read it, there was an earthquake. […]

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In which I am rejected: once again, kindly

“ToB” has come back to me. As with this story’s first outing, the polite and friendly editor has taken the time to write a personal note. In this case, he praised the style, and criticized the length and the finale. Like the first editor to have seen this story, he invited me to submit other work. I call that a pretty solid sophomore outing for this story. “Fail better,” I say to myself. Except I’m not actually sure there is a better type of rejection than this–one step up the ladder lies acceptance. (If only this wasn’t my best work! It quite outshines the other stories I’ve written since. I guess that’s where the “fail better” will have to come in.) […]

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Rejection!

I get such nice rejections. This one was a personal note telling me that my story, although not right for their publication, was beautifully done, and inviting me to submit others. Apart from acceptances of course, this is the best kind of letter to receive. (Even better than the ones from my grandmother containing money, in fact.) It gives me confidence that this story (which I myself also thought was beautifully done) will find a home in the near future, and it encourages me to continue with my other stories, one of which will surely find favour with the editor in question. I cannot imagine a kinder thing to do for a beginning writer. Thanks, editor! I am possibly anomalous among writers in that even form rejections are a pleasure for me to receive. Firstly, they relieve the anxiety that stems from having a piece on submission, if only for the few days it will take me to put it back in the mail to someone else. More importantly, though, they’re tangible evidence that I am taking steps in this, my profession. Real, businesslike steps. I’ve learned so much from my many failures in my other profession that I’ve stopped […]

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