One poem was accepted for publication in Snakeskin’s current issue, but the editor rejected 5 others. Letters including rejections: 15 Poems rejected: 65
Three month (approximately) rejection from Tin House. A rejection from an agent whose name I forget, but that's okay- saves me from notifying her that I'm withdrawing the submission as soon as I get my signed contract back. (Why am I here? I've already lost track of my rejection numbers. Must be because I like keeping up with the submission adventures of all 'yall.)
Agent rejections continue to trickle in here and there. 100-day form. Also got a higher-tier form after 27 days from Seize the Press. Nice to see the, "I hope you submit more of your stories to us in the future," but dang it would be nice to get at least one acceptance. At the midway point for the year, I sit at 71 rejections. ..and 0 smilies
I had two other rejections on the novel that I missed because I moved them into a different part of my record keeping chart. Correct total is seven rejections, two acceptances. That doesn't count the dozen or so submissions that I will withdraw as soon as I get the signed contract back. Without the withdrawal, the ratio would no doubt be considerably different. The novel was rejected 16 times in 2022.
I have 27 submissions out right now. Mostly short stories, accounting for 20 of those submissions. Two Poetry submissions. Five nonfiction. Many of my favorite publications are closed for submissions until the fall. So, I'm at 65 rejections and even if all my stories are rejected by the end of the year that still doesn't reach 100. And I can't say responses for all those submissions are likely to come by the end of the year. I feel like I still need to make quite a bit more submissions to pull it off. And that's probably part of the whole challenge. My oldest submission has been out over 550 days. I did recently have a brief email exchange with them. They acknowledged that this is a super long time to make a decision, but it is still under consideration. I responded that they could take all the time they needed and that I was willing to do any edits or revision needed for publication. I sort of wanted them to know I would be easy to work with. This place is a BIG deal. I mean it feels good right now to know my story has been read and maybe re-read by editors and there's at least something in my story that are liking. Please just let me have this one!!! And currently they are the only place that has this story under consideration. I don't want to send it anywhere else while I wait to hear if them. Also, I totally love the recent responses listed on Duotrope. Every time rejections come in from this place they're at less than half the time my submission has been out. I like the idea that an editorial board is discussing my work. How is that not exciting? Does anyone else here have a submission that's been out a crazy long time? Does it make you a little hopeful and maybe a touch excited?
I do for a couple of short story submissions. Nothing close to 550 days (wishing you the very best); ~30 and 60 days out from their average rejections. Still hopeful. I used to get excited about agent queries that have been out for a few months, but I have noticed a disturbing trend since the advent of ChatGPT. Before then, it was expected for a lot of the email queries to be ignored with no form letter, but QT queries always got a response. Now, I am getting several queries getting auto-closed for no response after 120 days - and on top of that, those agents have put up a notice that they are no longer accepting unsolicited queries. That stinks !
This seems like a big change. If agents won't accept unsolicited queries, then a writer would have to find some way of being asked. Probably a well-connected MFA professor could make that happen. It just serves to make publishing more of a pay-to-play insider's game than it already is.
After a few months, I figure it means "no" and I quit thinking about that particular submission. A year and a half is a long time, but I'll just bet it means good things are in your future with this publication. I think perhaps you were the person who recommended Duotrope to me, and I thank you (or whoever it was) for that. The site made gathering an appropriate list of possible agents far easier than any other method I've used in the past. I still checked out each one via other methods before submitting, but the search feature on Duotrope eliminated a lot of sorting through possibilities. One gentleman responded to my query within three days with a request for a full, and shortly thereafter with a phone call interview that resulted in an offer of representation. This morning my agent (ha! listen to me: I have an agent) sent me the signed contract and a promise to be in touch soon about submissions. My next job is to formally withdraw the other submissions I made.
Is ChatGPT the AI thing? I haven't commented is any of the discussions on the forum about this, but the truth of it is that I feel confident in my writing enough to believe what I can produce is better than whatever AI could come up with. I, personally, feel that anyone who is or wants to be a writer should feel this way, and, if not, they are probably in the wrong business. We, as writers, are creators and artists. And a lot more goes into that than just coming up with an idea. I love playing with words and language. The execution is everything. I think using IA is sort of the equivalent of plagiarism. I mean you're stealing words and the writing. So what if it's a machine that wrote it and not a person. It's still not the would-be writers words they are passing off as there own. That's just my take on it. Some agents will close their submissions temporary when they have a lot of submissions to go through. Others may close when they have a full client list. A fair number of literary journals and magazines can do the same thing and shut down submissions kind of suddenly and not say when they will reopen to submissions. I know on Duotrope you can track submission times. And you can check to see when agents are opening up again. There's a feature where you can check submissions reopening and they update it every day. If you don't have Duotrope, you can message me and let me know if there are any agents or agencies you want me to keep an eye on for you.
Okay, full disclosure, I have an MFA and I also have a former professor that I've kept in touch with who has already offered to hook be up with his agent friend when I need one. But, also, I had an agent contact me after reading one of my stories in a literary journal. He asked if I had a novel I could send him. I told him I didn't at that time, but I would write one. And he said whenever I had one to send him an email. No time limit on the offer. And I would probably try the agent who reached out to me first even though both agents seem very successful and I'm sure both of them would probably be great to work with. I've also worked with two other agents in the past, but I've never had a book published. This was many years ago, like another lifetime. And it was for a nonfiction book which is sold on proposal. I worked so hard on that thing. It was somewhere between 50 and 100 pages. There was a big publisher showing some interest, but it never happened. Life happenings got in the way of my ability to follow through with that book. And I actually stopped writing altogether for a long time. One of those two agents I would be happy to work with again, but I'm not sure she would feel the same way. I guess I would think about trying that agents if I struck out on the other two. We did seem to work well together, and my old agent really knows her stuff. I sort of ghosted my agent back then, but about a decade has gone by since we last had any contact. I don't know. What do you guys think? All that was before I got an MFA. As far as MFA contacts, yes, there are some and I do use those connections when they're offered to me, but it hasn't always worked in my favor. I've been able to submit some stories directly to editors that have still rejected me. I've also had some acceptances from places where I had contacts or have made connections as a result of earning my MFA. I worked hard for that degree and became the writer I am today because of it. I know from experience, though, connections are not enough. My writing has to be at the level they are publishing and I also need a killer story. I'm not sure what you meant by pay-to-play, @Native Ink. Do you mean submission fees? I hate those things, but I'll admit I spend a good chunk of change on submissions when you add them all up. However, if I've got some connection where I can directly email an editor at a publication, of course, I'm going to take advantage of that. At the very least I'm going to bypass the submission fee. And at the best I sell my work. I don't have a lot of connections, and I don't feel like I can really count on any of the connections I've made or would make as a result of my MFA as a sure thing. If you mean paying for an MFA degree, there are a lot of programs that are funded or have funded slots. My MFA was fully funded for all of the students in the program. Plus, we got a small stipend and even a sign on a bonus of a few thousand dollars after we were accepted and agreed to go into the program. So, you could say I actually made money getting my MFA. I know not all MFA programs are funded, but there are good programs out there where it's possible to earn this degree without it costing you. That's what made it possible for me.
Thanks. I really hope so. I'm not super confident, but I am still excited that I've gotten so far with this publication. And, they may not be sure they want to say yes, they are also not sure they want to say no. I wish I knew what they were thinking. I recommend Duotrope to every writer. I love that it's out there for us. Yes, the search functions are amazing for both agents an publishers. And it really just makes the whole submission process quicker and easier. Someone told me about it years ago right before I made my first short story submission. So, I have just about every submission I've made logged on Duotrope. I'm not sure if I should admit this, but I think I've probably made somewhere around 1k submissions altogether over the years since I started doing this on a serious and professional level. Well, I did go through years of rejection and a lot of rejection before anyone accepted my work. Thus the rejection thread was born. I received 440 rejections before selling a story. And that's when a big-time publication bought my story. I've sort of come to terms with rejection being part of my life. Some friends say they couldn't handle getting so many rejections, but I think, for me, it's a necessary part of the process. And I believe it's worth all the rejections I get to then actually publish in some of my favorite mags and journals. Also, @Catriona Grace, your acceptance to rejection stats make me sick, you lucky dog. LOL, Just kidding. I'm very happy for you.
I had no idea this was true (now that I'm most likely too old to be chosen), but I suspect you may have set at least a few people on the road to a MFA.
If a publication requires a submission fee, it never makes it onto my list. Never. My objections to writers' conference contests funded by entry fees are less vociferous, but I don't enter those any more, either. Thank you, deadrats. It only took me sixty years of writing and half a dozen practice novels to turn out something one that got this kind of response.
I think you mean MFA, not MBA. But, yes, this is how it works. I didn't apply to any programs that didn't have funding. And the same is true for PhD programs for creative writing. My friend from the MFA program went on to get her PhD and she made this whole spreadsheet of who was teaching where and how big the stipends were and everything about the funding for every program in the country. She passed it on to me, but then I decided I was good with an MFA. That was a lot of work on its own for me. If people are interested in an MFA, I highly recommend joining the MFA draft on Facebook. They have one for every year and it was very helpful. Plus, everyone on there announces when they are accepted or rejected from programs so you also know when to axpect responses which all come in the spring, but they sort of do what we do here in some way. But you can also ask questions, and I found the group very helpful. I am editing this to add I'm not young either and it hasn't been that many years that I graduated. This was me going back to school after my life fell apart. In a way, the MFA saved me.
I know what you mean, but the majority of the places I want to publish do charge a submission fee of around $3. I submit a lot so it does add up, but it's the only way I can get in with or have a shot at publishing in these places. My goal has always been to get into certain journal and mags. I don't just want to publish anywhere. That might make me sound a little snobby, but I don't think I really am. I started reading literary journals, and that led to me wanting to be a part of that world. The whole reason I wanted to get an MFA was because when I read the author bios in the back almost everyone seemed to have one. I guess not everyone but a good number of them. So, if I want a chance with these places, I've got to pay. But a fair amount of them do allow free submissions for subscribers which I appreciate. And there are some good places that are always free to submit, including The New Yorker.
Points well-made. There's a difference between snobbery and discrimination, and I'm willing to bet you know which is which. The only thing stronger than my discrimination about where I publish is my Scotch-Irish, um, thriftiness.
I tried ChatGPT out of curiosity, and you can certainly write much better than it does. The "stories" it produced for me were terrible. No voice or depth to the writing whatsoever. For fun, I also asked it to rewrite the stories in the style of Shakespeare and Hemingway. They came out as a very bad imitations of those authors. Playing around with ChatGPT chased away any fears I had about it replacing creative writers anytime soon.
