One of the hardest things a writer will experience is rejection. It happens to the best of us, and the worst of us. Stephen King, Danielle Steele, Richard Bach, and Margaret Mitchell all have had to eat this bitter fruit. So, too, have John Steinbeck, Herman Melville and Dr. Seuss been treated to the unpalatable flavor of having their work rejected. No writer can escape it.

      Rejection is inevitable and unavoidable; it is a part of life, and a large part of a writer’s life. If you write and submit your work, you too will taste rejection. It can sting, it can hurt, and there is nothing you can do about it. Or is there?

      While you can’t control or predict the whims, critiques and opinions of editors, remember that you have choices. You can choose to hang your head and moan about injustice and insensitive critics while slipping into a pit of personal despair. Or you can choose to see your rejection slip not as a crushing blow to a fragile ego, but as a valuable experience.

Understand The Value

      To make rejection work for you, you must understand that what you have written has value, even if you a publisher or editor may not think so. The act of writing, preparing the manuscript, submitting it and waiting for the reply takes commitment and courage, valuable traits for any writer. The experience gained from doing these things has value as well; you are paying your dues. In any profession or hobby, practice is a necessary payment, an essential part of learning your craft. Don’t let rejection remove your resolve or hinder your determination. One day these payments of sweat, time, and patience may lead to the reward of seeing your work published, and perhaps even the greater reward of receiving payment for what you have written.

      Also of value is this fact: a rejection slip means you have had your story in front of an editor. Even if she didn’t like it, the next time you submit something, she may remember having seen your name before. And if the next story is better, she’ll appreciate the improvement. Editors don’t want to reject manuscripts. They would much rather find a quality story than have to reject one as unpublishable. Remember, too, that if your story has been rejected, it does not mean that you have been. Editors cannot reject you, only your work.

Put It In The Past

      After a rejection, recognize your feelings about it. You may feel angry, depressed, melancholy, or some other combination of negative emotion. However you may feel, be sure to let it out and let it go (don’t hurt anyone, verbally or physically, in the process). These feelings are real, but keep in mind they don’t have to stay with you, and holding onto them does no one any good. It’s normal and perfectly okay to feel wounded, misunderstood, and besmirched by rejection. It is not okay to allow rejection to keep you from continuing to write.

      Try being creative about getting over it. Writers have been rejected since the first written words in history, and have devised weird and elaborate rituals to put rejection behind them. Some writers paper their walls with rejection slips, others line drawers and bulletin boards with them. Some will diligently stuff them in a binder, hauling it out to reminisce in triumph after having been published. Writers have even posted their rejection slips on internet webpages, apparently to share their misery with the electronic community of fellow scribes.

      Do what you must with your rejection slips. Make paper airplanes and set them on fire. Line your birdcages and litter boxes with them. Tear them up and stuff them in a pie, shipping it to the editor that rejected the work (so that you can delight in the thought of the editor eating his words). Drop them in your recycling bin. Take them to the top of a building and fling your rejections into the sky, watching them float to earth in the breeze. Tie them to a red balloon and send them up toward the heavens. Clean your bathtub with them. Make paper voodoo dolls. Do whatever you think necessary (try not to break any littering laws) to get past it, get over it, and get going on what you need to do next.

Finding The Cause

      Take a deep, cleansing breath. Time to get honest with yourself. Time to determine why the piece has been deemed unfit for reader consumption. You need to identify why it has been rejected, if you can, to give yourself direction in reworking the story.

      Most magazines will not tell you why your piece has been rejected. Editors and assistants are deluged by manuscripts; understand that many simply have no time available for personal replies and honest critiques. In these cases you will receive a form letter which tells you something like this: “We at Pretentious Publications are sorry, but your work does not meet our needs at this time,” or “Thank you but no thank you,” or “Please attempt to fall off the face of the earth and don’t bother sending us your infantile, ridiculous ramblings that you have the audacity to even consider calling a story.” I am convinced there is a special place in hell reserved for any magazine editor that rejects your work with that last line.

      Smaller publications and some literary magazines can often take the time to actually treat you as a person instead of a piece of paper, giving you reasons why they believe your work is not ready for publication, or why they specifically do not want to publish it. Remember that while this personal attention is valuable, it is up to the writer to determine the validity of the critique and the best way to use this information in making the work better.

      Read your story again. The distance between the time you sent it and the moment you begin rewriting a rejected piece can sometimes alter your original perception. Ask those ever-present tough questions: Is there anything here that is not necessary to the telling of this story? Could I add anything to the story to make it more complete? Does the story follow the fiction writer’s rule of showing the reader, not just telling? Can I afford to order a pizza so that I don’t have to stop writing to cook dinner? 

      Another helpful avenue to determining why a piece has been rejected is by getting another opinion. Prey upon a trusted friend, perhaps a fellow writer, to read the piece for you with an eye on possible problems. You need a friend who will give you an honest but thorough critique. If you have already had this person read the work before you sent it, try to find someone else. A fresh opinion can offer valuable clues as to what you may need to do in reworking the manuscript.

      Open yourself to possibilities that may not have occurred to you during the initial writing of the story. Consider writing in a different voice. Try third person if the story has been written in first person, and vice-versa. See if the piece would benefit by focusing on another character, or by having a different character as narrator. Does changing the perspective help? Even though you may think that you aren’t willing to put the time into a complete rewrite, think again. You should want to tell your story in the best way, to communicate what you are trying to say as effectively (and as entertainingly) as you can. Sometimes this means going all the way back to the beginning.

      It’s sometimes a tough call to discern what may have caused your piece to get the red pen of rejection. If you are a practiced writer, you will come to the point where you can identify your stories problems and begin to solve the rejection riddle. If you are not yet to that point…keep writing. You’ll get there.

The Rewrite

      After you consider the information you have gathered concerning potential problems with the manuscript, it’s time to let loose with a rewrite. When rewriting, do not forget the aforementioned cardinal rule of fiction writing: Show, don’t tell. Don’t just say “Sonja was full of herself.” Show her lingering too long in front of a reflective store window or belittling a friend to build up her own self-image. Don’t say that Edward was a mean person. Show him kicking a dog or cutting off someone in traffic just to tick them off.

      Remember that your manuscript may not need a complete reworking. Perhaps you can make it better simply by editing out anything that does not further the story. Writers often give the reader too much information. While the writer may need to know the history of the character’s unhappy childhood, the reader will not be concerned with this unless it is germane to what is happening to the character in the story.

      When you have identified the problems with your rejected work, and you have corrected them to your satisfaction in a rewrite, you’ve got get back onto the horse that has thrown you. Saddle up and ride that story out there again.

Research Other Markets

      Ideally, when you first prepare to submit your work, you should have more than one market in mind. Three is a good number for starters. There are many, many magazines out there, but only a limited number will be a good fit for a particular piece. By determining several potential markets, you are ahead of the game if your first or second choices reject your piece.

      Check those guidelines. If the guidelines tell you they don’t want to see vampire stories, don’t waste your time submitting one, even if you have a new twist or believe you have outdone Bram Stoker’s Dracula.     Watch your word count. Again, you are wasting valuable time if you think that your story’s quality beats a publication’s specified quantity and the editors are sure to give you a break. Guidelines exist for certain reasons. One of those reasons is to not waste an editor’s time by having to read work that does not meet the magazine’s stated submission guidelines.

      Consider webzines. Perhaps you would rather stick to submitting to print markets, and that’s fine, but e-zines are often more open to submissions from new writers. They are also gaining respect and becoming more acceptable as markets to writers in general.

Send It Again

      There’s not much else to say about this, so I’ll repeat it: Send it again. Get that rejected story back out there blazing a trail through the slushpile jungle. While you won’t receive a rejection slip on the story that sits on your desk, you also will not get that story published. Risking rejection is part of being a writer. Submitting is an integral element of believing in your work and your worth as a writer. Send it and forget about it, until you see in your mailbox either another rejection slip or that beloved acknowledgment of acceptance.

      Rejection can be frustrating, and yes, even painful, but getting a rejection slip is not a dead end unless a writer chooses to see it as such. Rejection should not be seen as an indictment of your writing talent (or lack thereof), but instead as an opportunity, a chance to grow in your writing. Learn to accept rejection, and learn to use it to your advantage. Ultimately, it will help you to become a better, more effective, published writer.

Originally published in Dream Weaver: A Magazine for Beginning Writers