Some Quotes From My Rejections (sorry, having a bad day)

Dave: I actually found this post helpful. I know I'm guilty of thoughts along the line "if I can just land an agent, my troubles will be over and a big publishing house will jump at my book." I guess agents increase your chances of getting the manuscript read but getting a publisher to go for it is like trying to get an agent? Meaning, once you get an agent you have to go through a second round of query hell, only this time your agent handles it? Seriously I'm asking because I don't know.

Good luck--maybe Lily's suggestion is just the ticket...Hope is a funny little critter, ain't it?

But it seems the problem isn't with you, it's with the people you're submitting to. Or something like that. I mean, they don't have a problem themselves, but they aren't compatable with the work, which is a problem. So there's still a problem, but it's not like you have to rewrite the entire thing, right? You just need to do some more market research.

Take heart!

Writing well is only the first step. Then you have to find an agent and/or editor who, because of his personal taste and his reading of the market (both more or less subjective beasts), wants to take a chance on your well-written work.

Well, you've achieved the first step. The rest is not silence -- go ahead and yell from time to time. Then put your stuff back out there. Persistence and luck, persistence and luck.

As an unagented writer, I can only leave you with a story about a famous book that once had trouble getting sold as well.

There was this series about a boy named Harry Potter, and it took pitching it to 9 publishing houses before it finally got picked up. Then, the agent told the author to make sure to find a good day job since she would never make a living off a kid's book.

I'm just sayin'. You need to hang in there and realize this will be part of *your* story one day.

David, I think that with the economy the way it is, it's just a really tough market for fiction these days. Editors not only have to fall in love with your book to buy it, the have to want to plan a huge formal wedding and then settle down and have its babies before they're willing to give you a contract. The translation of what you're hearing may just be, "There's nothing at all wrong with this book, but in this market..."

Which isn't the best news, but it means you are in the ballpark and if this doesn't sell now, something will eventually.

At least that's what I tell myself.

Hi, Dave, and bless your heart. I know what you're going through because we've discussed this from time to time. I wish I had a dime for every positive adverb and adjective they used to describe my work before they rejected it. I'm getting these "the market is very tough right now" responses myself.

An ugly truth: It's true that 90% of submissions might be crap and destined for the reject bin. You have to be in that top 10%, particulary to be picked up by an agent. Somewhere in the 2% realm to be accepted for publication by a house, without an agent.

Now, if you are agented and out on the sub trail, you are not competing with that 90% scrap heap. You're actually competing with that best of the best 10% agented material, which still floods the editor's offices. Hence, the odds narrow even further. As suggested above, it's kind of like another query hell, only a bit slower because we're not doing it.

On top of this we have no idea if the quota/slots have been filled for a particular publisher, as pertains to their spring/fall list. They can't shut down and refuse agented/non-agented subs, so they cruise through this period in a kind of non-buying overdrive. Publishers have inventory thresholds--some very large houses publish 800 titles a year, of which half of those might be fiction. Others knock out 400 or 200 titles. So it could be a timing problem--"our list is full" scenario.

Also keep in mind that there is a pretty substantial turnover rate in editorial positions. After a couple years, some editors might change houses or retire. So keep your eye out at Publisher's Marketplace for that kind of news--they announce these changes regularly.

Always stay on the hunt for new imprints. Every once in a while a large house will branch off and start a new imprint. BE READY. BE FIRST. Juno was an example of this not too long ago.

And...never give up and surrender to these bastids. Submit till hell won't have it. Wear them down to the nubs--frontal assaults--end around attacks. Don't let em breathe. Squash the competition. Show em that you're not going to take 'no' for an answer.

Good luck. Lock and load. I've got your 6-0.

Tri

I'll take that pesky "patience" thing, throw it under my draft (horse that is, not novel : ), let it get banged up and annoyed, and then give it back to you. Then, you're even. : )

Hang in there. Literally. I understand if I annoy with this next, but at this point, living in the land of the neverending form rejection, I wish I had your rejections -- so, each move forward is a ladder rung. You're on the ladder, making your way up. Just hang on tight, and don't look down!

Em

David,

As best as you can tell, are the rejections you refer to generic of personalized?

David--I went through what you describe (though not for as long a time) and it is so frustrating! Yes, TBurger, you describe exactly what happens when you have an agent. And the rejections at that level have a particular sting, because you can't tell yourself that your book never got a decent shot at getting read by an editor at one of the "big houses."

There is a thread somewhere in answer to the question of "how many queries before you got published?" It is reassuring. The one that sticks in my mind is Doreen Orion, whose "Queen of the Road" (out last week, published by Random House, lots of buzz) was rejected by something like 100 agents over 2 years, then by publishers for a stretch.

So don't lose heart!

Not everybody is going to see "unique" as good. Publishers can see it as not serving any particular segment of their market. Their distributors/marketers might not know which already-successful books might work in comparison to yours. Bookstores might not know where to put it and what comparisons to make. Because of all this, agents might not know a buyer that would be interested. These problems are much worse in the genres than in literary fiction. Buyers and agents are often looking not for the "unique," but for a version of what is already there and being bought.