How many rejections before retiring a short story?

If I have faith in the story, then I'll rewrite it and re-submit it. I'd probably allow a significant amount of time to pass before trying to do so, so that upon returning to it I'd have a new perspective, but I don't think that a story should ever just be 'retired'. It's kind of a defeatist attitude, you know?

When I've run out of markets.

Even then I'd probably just rewrite it and start over again.

I echo shadow ferret. Whenever it comes back, send it out again. And keep sending it out. But running out of markets might happen sooner than you think. I try not to submit to non-paying markets, and that cuts down the options somewhat.

The most rejections for something that sold (to a paying market, but not pro) was 12. My average when I was getting better was about 4 or 5 rejections per story. The first story I wrote (which I'll get back to rewriting at some point) got rejected 25 times before I gave up.

Since then, I've become better at writing and identifying whether a story will sell or not. The last two submissions I heard from sold to the first place I sent them. I've got four more out that I'm hopeful of selling (some editing was needed, but I'm either past the slush reader, or the editor has written to me to ask for some changes and to resend). I'd say my average now is 1 or 2 rejections before the story sells.

I got (and still get) consistently rejected by F&SF (JJ Adams just doesn't like my writing, fair enough), Cemetery Dance, Strange Horizons, and a couple of others.

I send a story to all appropriate professional-paying markets (and a few semi-pro paying markets that I like/have a good name etc). If it gets bounced from those, I put it up on Smashwords/Kindle/B&N.

So... never retire it?

izanobu said:

I send a story to all appropriate professional-paying markets (and a few semi-pro paying markets that I like/have a good name etc). If it gets bounced from those, I put it up on Smashwords/Kindle/B&N.

So... never retire it?

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Beat me to it. This is my approach as well. Target a few specific, pro paying markets or markets important to you to want a credit from.

If they all pass on it, post it for sale as an ebook and move on to writing the next story.

It depends on the story. If I really have faith in it as it is--absolutely feel that it needs a home--I keep sending it out. Many times it does finally land somewhere, albeit not what I originally planned, but it's out there.

There was one short that I loved. It took about two years, many submissions, and finally it happily landed in a good print magazine.

If I have that gut feeling it's just not going to fly, I usually do a drastic rewrite after letting it sit for awhile, or incorporate some part of it into a new short, even if it's only a few sentences or a character.

So I don't just give up and toss my work. None of it.

Shadow_Ferret said:

When I've run out of markets.

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This.

And even then, if I still believe in a story, I'll find something to do with it. I had one story which went the rounds, and it got close a few times, but never hit with anyone. So, I put it up on Smashwords and ended up with several hits. When ResAliens came to me with a request for a short story collection, I gave them 10 stories and they ended up requesting this one as an 11th for the collection (after having rejected it previously).

Go figure.

If I really believed in a story, I would never retire it. I'd submit to all the pro and semi-pro markets that are interested in stories of that genre until I ran out. If none took it, I'd figure out a way to rework it, as others have.

If I didn't believe in one of my stories though, it wouldn't see the light of day until I DID believe in it. I'm not going to put out something that I feel isn't the best I can do. Of course, I say this now, and I'm only just starting to wade into the world of short story writing. So take what I say with a grain of salt.

21 is my max before I sold (semi-pro). I'd tweaked that story so many times, I probably ended up putting enough time into it to write three other stories. (Would probably have been better off doing so as well.)

This year I've promised myself I wouldn't do that again.

Nicole

Send it out five times. If it's rejected all five times, look at the first page and edit/rewrite. Submit to five more. If it's rejected all five times, give the entire manuscript a full edit/rewrite. Submit five more times.

At least that's the advice that's been given to me by teacher/writer whom I respect.

I've no plans to ever retire a story. I'll submit every one of them until I'm out of pro and semi pro markets, and at that point I'll consider going token. Of course, it's not necessarily the same story from start to finish. I revise between rejections, often. But it's still generally the same story/concept.

The_Red_Wing said:

How many times would you allow one short story to be rejected before deciding to "retire" it? Or maybe you decide to rewrite it and re-submit?

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I've written seven short stories/novellas in the past two to three years. I've had one short story published and a novella coming out next year. The rest did not get published. I am in the process of rewriting one at the moment called Deep Embrace. It was the first short I had ever written. It came in at around 6k and I subbed it to magazines that were wrong for it but I got some great comments.

I loved the story so I decided to go back and rewrite it someday. It's now over 32k long and on the verge of possibly becoming a novel. The rest of my stories I will let sit. I only rewrote DE because I loved the plot about mermaids. If I go back and rewrite all those other stories I will never get around to working on something new. It becomes an endless circle. Rewrite, rewrite, submit, then rewrite again. At some point you have to label a failed story as a learning experience and move onto a new project.

I used to spend years and years reworking the same stuff. It really sucks out your energy and love for writing. You become bored.

I never fully retire them, they just sit on the hard drive waiting for the perfect market to appear. Some have sold ten years after I wrote them.

Thanks for the advice. I have heard the submit five, revise, submit again advice from others too. I'm still waiting on some rejections before I sent mine out again. It is a long waiting game.

I wouldn't go by numbers. If you think of something that needs to be changed, change it as soon as it's free. If not, don't tinker for tinkering's sake.