Resilience | Paul Pens

This article in The Guardian is worth a read:

Rejection is the norm for authors. So why do we hide it? | Sophie Mackintosh

Sophie Mackintosh mentions “steadily getting rejected from every creative writing MFA (master of fine arts) I applied to, and then by dozens of agents,” but doesn’t specify how many times.

Her one published novel is The Water Cure:

The Water Cure

I was rejected (or ignored) 750 times from 2013-2019, before attracting the interest of Hodder & Stoughton’s The Future Bookshelf submission scheme in July. I’m still waiting to hear back from them. I have a feeling that I won’t!

I’ll be slightly disappointed if they reject me, but not destroyed, for after so many rejections, I’m as resilient as a rhinoceros wearing Kevlar armour! I’m ready to self-publish on KDP Select, which will at least offer immediate feedback on the worth of my Cornish Detective series.

There’s more than one way to climb the publishing mountain, so don’t be discouraged.

I recently received my 40th rejection from the batch of 88 queries I made this February—yet again, it was from someone, presumably an assistant, whose name doesn’t appear on the literary agency website.

I’m bulletproof, so it didn’t bother me, but all the same I was heartened to read advice from a couple of publishing industry professionals in these two articles:

Eight reasons that even a good book is rejected by publishers

Every Writer Needs an Editor, Especially if that Writer Is Also an Editor

I will endeavour to persevere, though I’m trying a different approach to raise my profile by entering as many competitions as I can afford.

As 20th-century Canadian surrealist painter, Mimi Parent advised:

Knock hard, life is deaf.

Paul Pens

Tag Archives: Resilience

Resilience from Rejection

Why Manuscripts Get Rejected

Real Write, Real Edit, Real Publish