Wednesday 28 May 2008

Coping with Rejections

Rejection is just part of life when you are a writer. It doesn’t stop hurting, though. It is definitely the down on the roller-coaster. Or is it?

At least when you’ve had the rejection you can move onto the next submission. I have my really beloved baby, The Prophecy, out there now. One publisher has the first three chapters and a synopsis. They’ve had them a couple of weeks. They haven’t acknowledged them and I have a creepy sort of feeling that maybe they didn’t get them: they were emailed as an attachment. But I don’t want to ask yet, as it might sound like nagging.

I did send another query letter yesterday, again by email, and the answer came back: no they don’t publish YA. It didn’t say that in their guidelines and they looked just the zany sort of publisher who would. Oh well!

I’m not hurrying this one. I’ll go for likely looking people as I see them and only proactively seek new opportunities as the rejections come in. I’m really waiting on my first publisher as being published with them would be so appropriate. Meanwhile, I’ll get on with other writing.

I know another writer who just calls rejections “rewrites”. I guess that is an optimistic way of looking at them. I can see that that works for those rejections where you get some feedback. I’m not sure that it works for the ones which are just standard slips. I guess, though, that you make a mental note of the fact that that imprint doesn’t quite fit the style and content of your writing. Can you make it a better fit? If not with this piece, then with another?

Hopefully, the more you write the better you get.

In any case, I can’t not write. It seems to be in my blood now.

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