A little while ago I submitted my super villain story My Masked Lady for publication in a small online e-zine. As you can guess from the title of this post, it wasn’t accepted. This marks my first official publication rejection.
It was one of those copy-and-paste rejection emails. Whoever had done it, if it was sent by a person and not a bot, had even left in the fill-in-the blank lines and cut in the title of my story in the middle of it. It’s hard to take an email like that personally. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting to be published… though there was that tiny part of me hoping I would be, and if not, then at least a little feedback. I got neither.
I think this is par for the course. I’ve heard a lot of similar rejection stories from other writers.
Naturally, I’m disappointed. I am trying to see the good in it though.
A couple of years ago, I wouldn’t have dared submit a story to a publisher. That’s progress. Last year, I told myself I had to be querying at the age of 23. I wrote a query letter and sent it off right before my 24th birthday. That’s progress (ish). I’ve written this post and let the world know that I’m pursuing publication. That’s progress.
Maybe I don’t have the self-discipline to be an author. Or maybe I’m setting myself unrealistic goals. Or maybe I need to reach out for help. I don’t know. All I know is that this publication journey has been a lot longer than I’d wanted it to be, and will probably be longer still. I’m going to push this rejection to the side and keep going. What else can I do?
If you’re interested in reading the rejected story (Wow, what a sell -.-) you can do so by clicking here.
