Rejected by AW

popmuze said:

I'm new to the share your work board, but I'm wondering if my experience is typical. Not certain what genre my piece falls into, I placed it in Humor and Literary. So far, in Humor it's 0 for 6 and in Literary it's 0 for 5. Does that mean five people have looked at it in both places?

Regardless, I have to assume that anywhere from five to eleven people have now read at least some of the piece without having anything at all to say about it! I'm not looking for praise here, just feedback, come what may.

It's one thing to be rejected by agents and editors, with form letters or utter silence, but when it's the AW community, that hurts.

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Don't take it personally Popmuze If you scroll through all the threads in the SYW section--comparing number of replies vs. views you will see that there are dozens of posts that have gotten 0 replies or maybe something like 1 reply for over a hundred views. I think I may even hold the record in the poetry forum for the most reads vs. no replies--not that I'm braggin

Also, the board in general has been a bit quiet since the first of the year---I'm assuming it's because everyone is hard at work writing and submitting

It's par for the course, be patient, but most importantly don't feel rejected--it happens to all of us.

Awww, darlin, I know how you feel. I felt the same way when I first posted in the site about needing a mentor and no one ever responded. But eventually I noticed that not everyone got responses, so I felt better.

I'm fairly new around here, so I've been hesitant to offer much in the way of writing advice; I'm an unpublished newbie with her first novel, so what do I know?

Wander over to the Humor forum and let the good folks there know you have something up you'd liked crit. Don't repost the piece there, just tell them it's in SYW and provide a link directly to the thread in SYW.

As for the boards, they typically get a little slow after the first of the year. The holidays are over and everyone's settling back down to make up lost time. Don't worry, people will be back in force soon.

popmuze said:

Thanks for the encouraging words. But I'm counting all of this toward the rejection pledge anyway.

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Why? The viewers aren't editors. In any case, I view lots of threads and don't comment, for a variety of reasons: no time, no real response, etc.

I agree with Sass. That's not really the point of the rejection pledge. The point is to submit it somewhere that can tell you they're not going to publish it. If you had submitted it to AW's newsletter, that would be different, but not receiving comments, that's not a rejection. When you're published most readers, nearly all, will not comment on something of yours that they've read.

Feedback is our nectar but we have to accept that it's usually a rare treat, not a regular meal.

Thousands of people have read my book and I've heard back from maybe 100. Hundreds of people get my emailed column every week and on average, I hear from about 15 or 20. Does that mean I have to assume that people dislike both? Nope. Unsatisfied customers are the ones who are usually vocal, who unsubscribe.

And, keep in mind sometimes no response means they don't really have anything constructive to say.

Would it feel the same if the board didn't display total views at all?

I'm one of the ones who read part of your post in the humor thread previously. Posting a reply in the Share Your Work forum generally takes a more thoughtful approach than most other forums; therefore I chose carefully what I reply to. If I think I can be helpful, I sometimes post a critique; at other time I don't think I can help (or I don't have the time at the moment). Often it has nothing whatsoever to do with the work itself.

You're probably find that once one person posts a reply, others will then join in.

I hope that helps explain things a little.

ac

Don't feel too badly. . . I posted something in the SYW thread in the Literary section more than a week ago, and no one still has provided me with feedback yet. . . I was actually feeling a little dejected about that as well. Actually, I kind of still do. Oh, well. Maybe someone will eventually say something about it.

I posted once in the Share section and got asked if English was my first language by a poster with 2 posts. Um, yes it is, and I haven't seen that person since. Go fig.

I'm not new to the boards but as far as post count it may seem like I'm relatively new. Take it from a thread stopper, lol...

Sometimes people who might have something to say will hesitate especially if you're a new member. Even constructive criticism can hurt if it's not delivered just so. It may be they don't want to drive you away... at least until you get used to the place.

I know this is probably going off on a bit of a tangent, but I think that something can be learned if you notice a thread getting minimal views. That might be how to make a catchy title. Given, we are all human and some of us are going to read authors that we have read before and know we can expect entertaining work from. This is not to say that a new author to AW is not producing entertaining work, maybe its just that they aren't "known" yet.

Personally, I rarely comment on someone else's work. I won't comment unless I have something precise and constructive or helpful to say, as I wouldn't want to steer someone wrong by just responding for the sake of responding. Maybe I should throw the occasional "Nice work" here and there.

Moondancer said:

Sometimes people who might have something to say will hesitate especially if you're a new member. Even constructive criticism can hurt if it's not delivered just so. It may be they don't want to drive you away... at least until you get used to the place.

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lol, that's probably why no one has said anything about my piece yet,. . . either that, or it's just terrible! I was actually kind of thinking that that may've been the reason. . . That's cool; it's all good.