In which I have rejection issues

[davidgillon]

So I'd no sooner gotten over Disabled People Destroy SF rejecting my fiction submission, than I got a rejection for my non-fiction submission - "didn't work for me". I suspect it may have been too confrontational for their liking. Turns out two rejections in relatively quick succession seems to double up on the effects. I was expecting the self-doubt and the depression, but the anger was new. Not quite sure how to deal with these other than to keep trying and seeing if I can build up a tolerance.

Damn, I really wanted to crack that market. Well, I want to crack any market, but that one particularly mattered to me.

The depression meant I was late getting back to my sister with my input for the next meeting re Dad's care funding, which meant she ran into various issues, and ended up with the two of us on the phone to each other at half past midnight last night, which is not an ideal time for discussing the technical minutiae of the CHC Decision Support Tool (though I suspect they'll be fairly freaked just by the fact we've looked it up and run through it ourselves). It turns out there is actually something more depressing than running through a benefit assessment form for yourself - running through it for a family member who can no longer handle it themselves.

One unexpected benefit of all of this was that when I went to open up the Word file for the DST, expecting to have to use Word Online, my desktop said "Hang on while I install Office" (or words to that effect). I'd worked out a couple of weeks ago that the desktop and laptop somehow had two different Microsoft accounts with the same email address, and when MS asked which one I was trying to use managed to get the desktop logged onto the laptop account, and that seems to have made the difference the next time I tried to open an Office file. I thought I was going to have to buy an additional license for the desktop to cover it (Word Online is too slow for anything but a backup), but clearly my Office subscription either covered the desktop under the main license or included a spare license - score!

When I should have been looking at the DST I was actually playing Ark. Which turns out to be very good as a distraction, but not so good for my wrists, which are stinging through overuse. I've had this before with other games, if I cut down on the amount I've been playing then they should settle down relatively quickly (but note the 'if'). I've also taken measures to cut down what I'm doing within the game by (quite literally) pitching two thirds of my dodos over the compound wall. OTOH I've now tamed two triceratops (Tyrone and Teri), which make good pack mules. Fortunately you can leave those tied to a hitching rail near a feeding trough and ignore them until you need them. I've also tamed six parasaurolophus (-opholi? Para, Ventura, Mara, Alpha and Omega and Lara) for riding. I only intended taming a couple of parasaurs, but Mara and Lara both spawned on my doorstep and it was easier to tame them than do anything else, while Alpha and Omega turned up as Mara and Ventura's egg.  What started out as a separate barn for the dodos (their squawking was driving me up the wall) has now become a dodo barn/general hatchery. Alpha and Omega worked fine (incidentally they have a particularly evil-looking colour scheme - black scales with orange highlights on their spinal ridges), but Tyrone and Teri's egg Treo dropped dead on me shortly after hatching. I'm now working my way through my stored fertile dodo eggs, but any hatchlings without interesting colour mutations get pitched over the wall - essentially I've turned into a breeder of overgrown budgies.

Comments

[vass]

Oof, I'm sorry about the rejections. That sounds hard.

[yhlee]

*support support*

[capri0mni]

"didn't work for me". I suspect it may have been too confrontational for their liking.

Leaving you to suspect the reason is frustrating enough as it is (criticism should be clear); leaving you to suspect it's "too confrontational" is worse... Especially since ableism needs to be confronted.

Disabled people get too much pressure to be agreeable as it is.

[davidgillon]

Two line rejections are fairly normal, unfortunately, and DPDSF probably drew quite a high volume of submissions.

The 'too confrontational' is just me analysing myself after the fact and concluding they might shy away from potentially reopening the whole thing with the Puppies - which I was using to make a wider point about SF being the only genre where there was organised mass resistance to We Need Diverse Books, which fed into the point I was making aabout Ship Who Sang teaching negative attitudes to diversity.

[capri0mni]

they might shy away from potentially reopening the whole thing with the Puppies

O-o-oh. Okay, yeah. Best let sleeping puppies lie.

[davidgillon]

But it is called "Disabled People Destroy SF" he points out logically ;)

[capri0mni]

*Nods* Yes.

[yhlee]

Ordinarily I would agree with you, but from the editorial standpoint, the primary function of an acceptance/rejection slip is not actually criticism--editors sometimes include critique, but they do so as a favor to the writer; it's not required. The function of the acceptance/rejection slip is exactly that: to let you know whether the story was accepted or rejected. I used to slush for an online zine (Apex) and we had a standard form rejection so that slush readers wouldn't be put in the position of arguing with writers over whether their works were suitable, etc. :] I wouldn't be surprised if Disabled People Destroy SF had a similar policy.

[davidgillon]

Oh, absolutely. I just took it as a form reject.

[capri0mni]

Point taken.
...Doesn't stop it from being frustrating, though.

[yhlee]

Oh, absolutely. :] It's an imperfect situation--of course from the writer's perspective it would be great to get more feedback from editors specifically, but there are time constraints on the editor's end, and also on the editor's end there are those few (minority) writers who ruin it for everyone else. As a slush reader I once had a writer respond to a rejection with a demand for personal mentoring, which I was not in a position to provide (and would have been a bad precedent for the other slush readers). It's hard. But there are a few editors who do make a habit of giving feedback--more power to them.

[hamletta]

Sending virtual hugs, tea and crumpets.

Rejections suck so much. I'd just got four in quick succession for what I thought was the best story I'd written in a while. But tastes are personal, and so are editing choices--even though knowing that doesn't make it any easier to swallow.

You probably know it but "didn't work for me" is standard wording for a rejection, precisely because it's subjective and so can't be argued with. There maybe a hundred reasons why they didn't take it--wrong day, wrong editor, wrong market. Keep sending it out, till one of the "wrongs" turns into a "right."

(Sorry if I'm stating the obvious. I often helps me to hear the obvious when I'm down so I'm hoping it will have the same effect on you...)

[davidgillon]

Very market specific, unfortunately, factual essay for the Disabled People Destroy SF special issue (following on from Gays and People of Color Destroy), and while the short story could theoretically be submitted elsewhere, more reallistically it needs to be rewritten at greater (possibly novel) length.

[hamletta]

Even if specific, "Disabled People Destroy..." will come back form other markets, just like Gays and POC did. So don't give up on this one yet.

And for the short story, then I'm all for turning those into novels. And we have Ricepaper, where I'm planning to ask for help on the novel I'm struggling with. So... race you?

(Or if that's adding to stress instead of being supportive, then just hugs and crumpets.)

[yhlee]

Would Strange Horizons be viable as a second market to try for the essay? They've run essays on all sorts of sf/f and adjacent topics before--it might be up their alley. Best wishes however it goes.

[davidgillon]

I'm inclined just to post it on my blog, it was something I tossed off in a couple of hours, so there was no great investment in producing it.

But I'll sit on it for a while.

[sovay]

I'm inclined just to post it on my blog, it was something I tossed off in a couple of hours, so there was no great investment in producing it.

Seconding Strange Horizons. I am no longer affiliated with them, but rushthatspeaks is, and they continue to publish all kinds of fiction and nonfiction on all kinds of axes.

Besides, that essay sounded great.

[sovay]

Damn, I really wanted to crack that market. Well, I want to crack any market, but that one particularly mattered to me.

Multiple rejections suck.

*hugs*

[hilarita]

Bummer. Still, nearly every published author has a fucking huge file of rejections. Obviously, the mental elf thing means you need to work on a process of dealing with rejections that works for you.
Also, benefit assessment forms suck.

Obviously the plural is parasaurolophulusessessessess. (Like Nanny Ogg's spelling of banananana.

[hunningham]

This is tough. Most people only have to deal with this kind of flat-out rejection when they're job hunting and that really hurts.

[davidgillon]

Thanks. I guess in some ways it is a form of job hunting, but when what you're selling isn't just your skills, but your creation, it's hitting in different ways.