I don’t imagine that anyone cares for rejection too much. As much as we don’t like it, it’s important for writers to admit that it is part of the landscape. I have a special place in my writing space called “The Wall of Shame”. It is in this place that I put rejection letters for all to see. I think we need to keep rejection in perspective.
So dontcha know that when I saw Other People’s Rejection Letters: Relationship Enders, Career Killers, and 150 Other Letters You’ll Be Glad You Didn’t Receive
Rejection Letters is about 200 pages worth of stinging, sometimes subtle, sometimes in your face actual rejections. Some are more famous, like the US Army discharge recommendation for one James Hendrix: “Pvt Hendrix plays a musical instrument during his off duty hours, or so he says. This is one of his faults, because his mind apparently cannot function while performing duties and thinking about his guitar.” Man, you gotta love that.
Other rejection letters include end of relationship correspondence that ranges from the sweet (but BS in my view) “let’s be friends” to rambling diatribe that makes damn near no sense at all. There are letters from a child to a parent and then there are things like this one from a mother to her son: “Sometime I think you are a big jackass but I love you – Mommie”
I love the format of the book. The pages are for the most part images or copies of actual notes, be they handwritten, printed emails or old letters written on typewriters. Some of the rejections are screenshots of text messages on cell phones. It was a very easy read and I was finished within two hours. What I found particularly amusing were rejections from editors that contained typos (Pot to Kettle!)
If you have received any kind of rejection letter in the recent past, this book will help to make you feel a little better about the rejection. Maybe it will give you hope. At a minimum it should give you a chuckle or two.
This is well worth checking out from your library, or better yet help me make a few cents and click on the link which takes you straight to Amazon.
Enjoy.
I guess all is forgiven with Random House?
I will check this one out at the library as I am on a book buying fast right now.
Cheers!
Tammi Kibler´s last [type] ..Editing My Writing: Knowing When to Say When
Hi Tammi.
Yeah, I figured an eagle-eyed tumblemoose reader would pick that up. I wrote this prior to the RH debaucle. I wouldn’t say that all is forgiven necessarily, but maybe this once…
BTW, the Palins installed a 14 foot fence along that side of the property. Hehe.
George
Hello George!
A good friend of mine once advised:
“You’ve got to have alligator skin!” if you intend to swim in the literary world, a watery netherworld filled with sharks and poisonous blowfish. This world is not for the fainthearted, for those with creative backbones better suited for “The Little Mermaid.” Ha!
Sure, sure, I understand that every publication has Writers’ Guidelines and that many would-be writers don’t even read them.
But in the New Normal, we writers now find that many publications do not even bother to send a rejection. They just ignore you.
So much of today’s publishing market is so sliced and diced into straitjacketing market segments that if your piece isn’t EXACTLY about vampires or teen angst or whatever, then they give you the heave-ho.
Just try to imagine a new, undiscovered creative voice who’s so plugged into the limitless creative source that he doesen’t fit the New Normal!
We’ll call this person Jenny or Johnny Hemingway. She/he slaves away and submits, submits, submits and is rejected, rejected, rejected.
What to do? Quit writing? OR quit paying attention to people who are more concerned about market share than about new ways of seeing the world we live in.
That’s exactly what I did. I created my own on-line digital publishing house. I craft short stories and offer them to the world at large. I skip the middleman and communicate directly with my niche of appreciative readers. They like what I write. They don’t like being manipulated into buying the Big Box bookstore’s version of what’s cool. They are rebels.
Like me.
And Hemingway.
Heck, even Jesus commented to the dudes of his day that a prophet is often not respected in his own country.
And look how many rejected him!
I think he had the last laugh.
Mr. Wayne Hemingway,
An excellent response. “Poisonous Blowfish”. I love that.
It’s easy to see that you will be successful. I love your unique writing style and the stories speak for themselves.
Thanks for being such an awesome contributor.
George
Hi George,
I enjoyed the Hendrix example — pretty funny, really.
Hmmm, I wonder if I did anything when I was in the Army to incite such comments? I did loose track of my M16 once, but found it in time to save my hide. Yeah, I wasn’t really much of soldier (I was a lover, not a fighter).
This looks like a good read, George. Thanks for the tip!
Have a great day.
~xo
Lori Franklin´s last [type] ..The Story of You
Lori,
Cheers. Here’s to being a lover and not a fighter, eh?
There are some pretty amusing rejections in this thing. I remember overhearing someone about to get kicked out of Denny’s quip, “Hell I’ve been thrown IN to betterplaces than this. Still cracks me up, that one does.
George
This book looks like it would be an interesting read. I’ll put it on my wishlist. You actually reminded me of a site called Clients From Hell and it’s basically examples of, well, clients from hell. Good stuff and pretty entertaining too.
http://clientsfromhell.net/
Christopher´s last [type] ..How to Make Your Business Stand Out Like Jeff Dunham
Hi Chris,
I’ll check that one out. I’ve got a story or two of my own in that genre!
George
lol That looks brilliant. Nothing more entertaining than rejection that isn’t your own!
Ray Martin´s last [type] ..Free is the best. Anything free is good.
its so hard to reject that. do you ?
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