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Rejection

Rejection is part of the creative process, any author/artist/creator will tell you that. Does its commonality make it easier? No. Many great people faced rejection before success. 12 publishers rejected JK Rowling. Stephen King's Carrie was rejected 30 times. Beatrix Potter had to self publish. Do these facts make rejection easier? Nope.

Today I officially received my first rejection. I will admit, I cried and was sick. Its hard to hear that someone isn't interested in your work. Its not just something you whipped together in a matter of hours and plopped down for the world to see. Its years of hard work, scarified free time and social life, and deep soul searching. Its not an easy to thing to let someone see it. Its the most vulnerable I've ever been in my life.

All that being said, I have to say that my first rejection was probably one of the most kind rejections anyone has ever received.  The agent didn't say it wasn't good, or even that it was flawed. She simply said that she did not connect with it in a away that would make her comfortable representing it. Then she added that she looked forward to seeing where ended up.

Still cried, but not for much as I could have if she'd been mean...or even just less kind.

Alas, we press on. Today I am putting a final polish on some queries and sending them out. I will be sending out 8 total. A few of them to my top choice agents. I know that these rejections (if and when they come) will hurt because these are the ones I've been researching (read stalking) on twitter and other sites.  But even if all 8 decline, I will press on. Where would the greats be if that had given up?


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