I recently submitted a short story that was rejected. Of course, that hurt the ego, but we all know rejection is part of the game. I was hoping though I could get feedback from anyone about something written in the rejection reply. The editor told me to submit material in the future. Is this something they tend to tell everyone or should this be perceived as an actual invite to submit more material? I have a feeling my story my better suit another genre than the one the magazine publishes, but I don't want to be naive, if what they are really doing is letting me down nicely. Any comments and thoughts appreciated.
A lot of magazines have rejections stating that they encourage future submissions, so it's not anything special. The truth is that most magazines actually do encourage people to submit other stories in the future. After all, they need writers to keep their magazine going. So I would definitely recommend trying the magazine again (and again) if you feel your story is a good fit for what they are looking for. If a story isn't under the genre that the magazine wants, then submit it elsewhere, to a magazine you feel would be a more appropriate home for it.
It sounds like a form letter rejection, so that particular piece didn't rate high enough on first impression to warrant a more personal response. So what can you infer from that? Absolutely nothing other than that the submission was declined. It doesn't mean the story was crap. It could as easily be that yours was in a stack of fifty submissions, and the submission editor's eye was caught by other pieces before yours even came to light. Try looking through a week's sort story contest entries to vote on them. Now imagine multiplying that by ten or more, and doing it every day. You will almost certainly develop the habit of skimming a couple paragraphs, then out of those, choose the ones that made the best first impression for a full reading. So keep track, so you don't inadvertently submit the same story more than once to the same publisher, but keep on submitting. There are a lot of submissions you are competing with, and luck plays a part too. You won't be successful without skill, but skill alone is not sufficient.
Many markets have that wording in their form rejections. And as you indicated, getting rejection notices (form and/or personal) are part of the process of getting published. Hang in there. Terry
