No, thank you

Nearly a month has passed and so it seems the time is ripe for updating this blog. I'd been holding off in the hopes that I could report a sale or two, but alas, the nomailman has been visiting me every day.

Two days ago, I finished the rough draft of my fourth novel. To make it clear, I've never sold a novel yet. I only queried on the first one. The second I trunked right away. The third is going through revisions before I start mail-bombing agents with it.

As for short fiction, my resumé there is brief as well. I've made three sales, only one of them to a pro mag. (Technically, I've made four, but the last acceptance was in October, and here it is the latter half of July and I've heard nothing from the editor, with nary a contract nor check in sight. So that one's off the "sold" list.)

With such an unimpressive track record, I've been feeling like I have nothing to say to other writers and would-be writers. Who am I to tell anyone how to write a novel, a short story, or even an angry letter to one's congressman?

But one area of writing where I do have plenty of authority is rejections. Ah, yes, the old slammers. I've racked up a good, oh, I'd say hundred fifty rejections with my short stories alone over the years. So, in this realm of the writing world, I think I can speak with some authority.

My first piece of advice is: Suck it up.

It doesn't matter whether it was a form rejection or a handwritten note from Sheila Williams herself. It doesn't matter whether the editor gave you advice, a critique, or told you to stop burning trees. Suck it up and move on. Yes, it hurts. It hurts the worst when you're just starting out, and every form rejection feels like a personal judgment from God telling you to give up on your dreams. Don't give up if this is really what you want to do. But know -- you must know and accept -- that rejection is a reality of a writer's life that never goes away. Even when you're the most famous, the richest, or the most lauded writer in the world, there will be some editor somewhere who looks at your latest submission and says, "No, thank you."

My second piece of advice is: Don't take it personally.

The editor really isn't judging you, and she isn't even judging your writing -- she's just judging that single story right in front of her. And unless you get a very detailed personal rejection, you'll never know precisely why she rejected it. Maybe yours was the fifth Zombie Cat Saves the World story to come across her desk that morning. Maybe you wrote in a lyrical style and she likes it more realist, or vice versa. Maybe she's got 500 other stories competing for five spots in her upcoming issue, and to get one of those five spots, your story had to be spectacular, and instead it was only great.

The editor who rejects your story is not telling you to give up. He is not telling you never to submit anything to them again. And unless you get a rewrite request, he isn't suggesting you change your story. He's just saying, "No, thank you."

My third piece of advice is: Send that story right back out.

One editor's rejection does not equal rejection by every editor in the known universe. Tastes differ, a magazine's needs differ. A "No, thank you" from Weird Tales might get an acceptance from Gordon Van Gelder. To borrow a phrase from J.A. Konrath, the definition of a successful writer is one who didn't give up. So as soon as you get that rejection, look at the market plan for that story -- you do have a market plan, don't you? -- cross out the magazine that rejected it, and print out a cover letter to the next magazine on your list.

My fourth piece of advice is: DO NOT RESPOND TO THE REJECTION!

Don't write the editor back asking for reasons why your story was rejected. Don't send an angry email condemning the editor's taste, standards, judgment, religion, race, gender, sexual preference or parentage. Don't splash your complaints (and, oh, I learned this the hard way) on your blog. If you simply must write something in response, write it on a piece of paper, put it in a stamped envelope, address the envelope to yourself, and mail it. By the time the angry missive comes back to you, perhaps you'll have cooled down enough to gauge how an editor would have reacted upon reading it. In short, badly. Just don't do it.

And my final piece of advice is: Keep good records.

There is nothing more embarrassing than sending the same story twice to one market.