The Wonderful World of Rejection. And When, Heaven Forbid, It's a YES!

Sometimes I'm so engrossed in my own rejections - and yes, I've a stack now - that I forget it can be just as hard to break into other industries. Over the past few months, The Man has been submitting his first feature-length film to festivals around the world and receiving his fair share of that dreaded letter himself.

He made me laugh the other week when he told me his new strategy. When he receives an email, he doesn't read it. He just hits 'Control F' - for 'Find' and types in 'regret'. As soon as the computer locates the word 'regret' in the email, he knows he's been rejected. He doesn't even read the whole thing!

I used to pour over every word, trying to decipher a hidden meaning. Until I discovered the hard way - through every writer's friend, Google - that a seemingly personalised rejection letter was, word for word, exactly what loads of other rejected writers had received. Now, I scan such letters, add them to my stack, and move on. It hurts less and less, but as the letters add up, it sometimes makes you wonder if it'll ever happen.

But it can!

Saturday night, pre-X-Factor (yes, big Saturday night, I know). I was in the kitchen, covered with flour, rolling out the dough for our pizza, when I heard a whoop and the thump of footsteps running over to me. The Man grabbed me and danced me around, flour and all -- he had received an ACCEPTANCE to the Sao Paulo International Film Festival, one of the top 50 film festivals in the world, according to Variety Magazine.

He - we - were walking on air for the rest of the weekend. It can happen, after all!

My First Ever Rejection Letter: 1989

Like most people who write as adults, I started writing early on in life. My first project was entitled 'Disasters in Florida', a non-fiction narrative detailing my family's trip to Orlando when I was nine. It was fraught with troubles such as delayed airplanes and damaged rental cars. A great subject for a novel!

Hot on the heels of that success, I began my second project, fictional this time. It told the story of Angela, a girl who wanted to become a gymnast but was held back by her poor family's finances. I can't recall the title but I do remember I drew a great illustration on the cover.

When I was eleven, I decided to get serious. Inspired by Gordon Korman, a Canadian teen who published best-sellers, I was determined to write a proper book this time. My subject: a handicapped girl who wanted to become a champion diver. She would defeat all the odds -- overcome her disability -- and win the gold. Typing away on the trusty Commodore 64 during the hot summer months, the novel began to take shape. My interest dwindled when school started, though, and the project languished until a year or so later when I got a second wind and decided to finally finish it. Sixty pages later, 'Glint off the Gold' was born.

I have to laugh reading it, but it's actually quite a morbid story. Anne, my main character (named after Anne of Green Gables), loses her best friend to a drunk driver and her Grandmother for reasons I can't quite recall. And Anne herself dies of cancer at the age of 40.

Full of enthusiasm to have finished my 'fictional only' story, I was sure it would get published. I looked in the front of some of the books on my shelf and decided to send it away to Tyndale House Publishers. Tyndale House is a Christian publisher and I thought they might be nicer. So I printed out the whole thing, shoved it in an envelope and sent it off.

Time (almost a year) passed and I'd pretty much forgotten about the whole thing until I got a letter in the post turning down my offering. Disappointed, I put the whole thing aside and straight out of my mind.

It's only now, twenty years later (yikes!), when I'm querying agents to try to get published that I truly appreciate the response from the Vice-President and Editor-in-Chief (or his assistant). I didn't include a self-addressed envelope, I had no cover letter, yet someone took pity on me and decided to respond anyway.

And thus, my journey towards getting published had begun.

Rejection, Rejection, Rejection

I'm getting ready to send out queries to agents for my second novel. I've been slaving away on the query letter and synopsis for the past few weeks, all while obsessively working on polishing the final draft. And what shall I face after all that hard work? Fingers crossed, some (one! just give me one!) positive responses. One thing I know for sure: I will be rejected.

Benjamin Franklin said: 'In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.' For a writer, I'd like to add rejection to that list. It's a occupational hazard.

I read a lot of agent blogs, and I know they get no joy from sending hundreds of rejection letters each week. I also know that a lot of what they receive is ill-conceived and poorly written, and deserves to be rejected. And there is a myriad of other reasons why what you send may not be right for them. Still, it is hard to be on the receiving end of generic rejections.

With my first novel, I only pitched agents in the UK. It cost an absolute fortune, as most agents only accept snail mail and you need to include your cover letter, synopsis, first three chapters and a self-addressed envelope so they can return the whole thing back to you. In total, I sent out about twenty such packages, which means I paid around £70 for the honour of being rejected. A few even returned my package back to me with a slip of paper that they weren't taking on any new clients (and yes, I had checked their website before sending in my submission).

One rejection I received included some promotional material on books the agency was publishing. One such book was on how to write (I can't recall the exact title right now and I'm not in the mood to leaf through my rejection letters to find it!). I realise the agency was likely only trying to help, but it was like a slap in the face. No, we won't publish your book - but hey! Look at these other authors who did manage to get published! And here's one to help you write! Grr.

I know rejection is a necessary part of the process, something that 'will only make me stronger.' But that doesn't mean I have to like it.

Stay tuned as the rejections trickle in over the next few months...