Rejection Ratio

I've posted this before, but I came across it again this weekend, and it strikes me (again) as so smart that I wanted to repost it.  It's from the inestimable M.J. Rose and Angela Adair-Hoy’s book How to Publish and Promote Online ~ M.J. Rose’s chapter "Last Words." It seems to me a very healthy way to look at things, no matter what sort of project you're trying to put out there.

Like it or not, people say no more than they say yes. But when I started out on my own in the publishing business I got paralyzed by the first few dozen no’s that I heard. Rejection is tough on even the most self-confident person. …

So I was telling a friend, who is a professional fundraiser, about my dilemma. She laughed and told me that in her business that the no’s are a good thing. “For each no you are getting closer to a yes,” she said. She even had a mathematical equation she’d worked out from ten years of experience. She had to get fifteen no’s to get a yes. And since she was asking for contributions for a worthwhile charity, her no-to-yes ratio would be lower than mine would. I could count on a thirty-to-one no-to-yes ratio.

So I started to tally the no’s.

In the first two weeks I got ten no’s.

In the second two weeks, twelve no’s. (I was starting to get excited, twenty-two no’s down, only eight to go. Finally, after six weeks and thirty-four no’s, I heard one wonderful, resonant yes. These no’s and yes’s were about getting a major reviewer to read my self-published novels.)

A funny thing happened to me in those weeks. I went from dreading and hating the no’s to understanding something about them. They represented hard work and determination on my part. I was proud of those no’s. Plus, the no’s were important. They weeded out the people I really didn’t want to review the novel anyway. Only someone who truly was open to the idea that a self-published novel could be any good was the right person to read it.

Evaluating Not-so-constructive Criticism

In yesterday’s post, I deconstructed some unsolicited, overwhelmingly negative feedback I got on the submission of a book of short stories to a contest, and I made a impassioned plea for your help ~ and you came through in a huge way! I can’t thank you enough for your reasoned responses and good advice and empathy. I owe you. (I mean that. Whenever you want to call in the favor, let me know.)

I wanted to recap your great advice (in the comments of yesterday’s post and also on Facebook). You guys said such smart things, and I wanted to pass them along.

Liz Prato said I was on the right track to compare that feedback with feedback I’d gotten from other places on the same stories. She said, “I've found that no matter how much I try to deconstruct negative feedback, it doesn't really make sense to me until a month (or more) later.” How very smart! In the middle of the white-hot first read, it’s hard to be objective.

Both Brad Green and Jenn Scheck-Kahn said really smart things about the strong reaction of the reviewer. Jenn asked whether the reader had to comment or if the comments were unsolicited. What a great distinction. The reader was not required to comment; therefore, the comments I received were unsolicited. She said, “If the answer is yes, this feedback shouldn't be taken seriously. … If the answer is no, that's a different story entirely and this feedback reads as someone who felt wounded, betrayed.” I definitely hadn’t thought about it that way. The reader fell a little in love with the work or had raised expectations, as Jenn said, but then she or he was disappointed.

Brad also made this point. He said, “Taking the time to tell you what's wrong, in their opinion, means they affected that reader nonetheless. I call that a win. Hate is as much a win as love. Hate doesn't apply to these comments, but anything other than dismissal is a win.” (Brad and I have talked about this before - how some people write to be loved and others write to be hated, but a strong reaction means you’ve hit a chord.) Jenn also made this point: “I tend to take strong responses more seriously than others because they reveal that a nerve has been touched, which is your ultimate goal, even if it's the wrong nerve.” Brad also made the point that some of the stories in the collection have been previously published, so a number of editors have liked them.

Jenn also said, because the reader was disappointed, she or he just stopped trying to understand what was going on. The reader’s comments became reductive. “This judge … believed in your skill but somehow the story stopped demanding that s/he keep paying attention. That's what I'd look at - what's missing? Are these stories lacking in ambition? The answer might be no - that you've stumbled on a bad reader or a good reader who gave a bad reading. But I think it's worth considation.” I love the distinction between a bad reader and a good reader giving a bad reading.

I also got some great comments from Facebook friends.

• Liz mentioned that maybe the reader was just in a really shitty mood. Good point.
• Bonnie ZoBell quipped, “If the critic likes your work it's valid. If not, it's spite.” Hehe.
• M.E. Parker said that some of the most helpful criticism he’s received was negative.
• He and C.C. Russell said that anyone who makes an overarching assertion about the nature of art (“Remember that art is not life. Art explains why something happens.”) is a little suspect; a more nuanced concilatory tone makes the comments more credible.
• Lucy Jane Bledsoe mentioned offering such negative feedback without the writer asking for it is suspect.
• Merrik Bush-Pirkle pointed out, about paying to enter a contest with grumpy graduate students as readers: “rather than get a studied and experienced critical assessment, you're getting subjectivity, bias, and limited perspective. And sure, probably a little spite borne out of a sense of self-preservation.”
• Michael Neff offered the great advice of only get critiques from the best people and look for commonalities.
• Erica Cote (an artist and my niece and friend) said that this in true not just in the art arena. Wherever you go, people have something to say.
• Tania Nyman made the very good point that she needs “a sense that the critic understands and agrees with what I'm aiming for. Often I get advice that may be valid, but it heads the piece in a direction I'm not interested in.”

Also, my friend Pembroke Sinclair emailed me to say that this person was not my intended audience and the comments were a little crass because they didn't seem to know what I was doing: "In that case, it might have been better if they kept their mouth shut."  I agree.

I really can’t thank you all enough!! Such smart things you all said, and I’ll be thinking about them for months. I owe you, I owe you!

From the bottom of my heart,

Tamara

I Need Your Help

What I’m Reading Today: This weekend I watched (parts of) A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof back to back, and it left me so bereft and in need of comfort that I picked up the first book of The Lord of the Rings to reread.

I think I need a little help from you guys.

On Friday, I received a rejection. No big deal ~ as writers we receive a lot of rejections. It’s part of the process. But this one is the worst one I’ve received. Lots of detailed negative comments. I’ve gotten lots of encouraging comments from editors, but, ah, this one.

I would like to say that I really appreciate the fact that they did take the time to comment. I even wrote them an email saying thank you. They get a lot of entries ~ the fact that they took the time is gratifying. And I can safely say that this person is not my ideal reader.

What I hope ~ beg, beseech you ~ is to give your take on the notes by commenting on this post. I’ll give you what is my take, after loooooong thought, and if you’d give me yours, I’d be forever grateful. And if you think that they are possibly right on and it’s criticism I should take to heart, feel free to say that too.

The rejection is for my book of short stories that I sent to a contest. I’m not going to say who gave them. So I’ll give their comment and then clarify and give my reaction.

1. “Spotted as a Leopard” - too short & no resolution. The full title is “The Year I Went Spotted Like a Leopard.” This story was an attempt at a short short. It’s only 675 words. I tried to make it clear but poetic. I’ve had other feedback on this story from journals that said, “We felt there was too much exposition in this story, particularly in the ending. We wanted the story to happen, to unfold naturally rather than be explained.” So, it is too short. I don’t think I’m good at short shorts. I haven’t gotten the hang of them, and I’m more interested in longer work. So that criticism is justified, I think. However, I think there is no resolution but it’s because I didn’t want there to be any. I often attempt a sense of closure without a resolution. A lot of my stories don’t have tidy endings. Just small turns or gestures. So this criticism is a wash, I think.

2. “Mouse” - She could have put them back where she found them. Also cows don’t have milk unless they have a calf of their own. In this story, a girl finds some baby mice whose home is going to get washed out with the spring irrigation, so she brings them home to raise them, but her father makes her kill them. So this criticism is on the basis of what is real and possible. This story didn’t work for the reader because she or he was not convinced of what happened in the story. I would refute the criticism on a purely factual basis: No, she could not have put them back because the irrigation ruined their home, and if she touched them, it is possible that the mother mouse would reject them and eat them. Also, yes, a cow does have to have a calf to have milk, but one of the calves she's feeding is hers. I probably didn’t make that clear. I took it for granted that the reader would know that. But even then sometimes you have a milk cow that her calf is older and weaned but she still is giving milk so you feed the bum calves without her natural calf. So as facts I think the reader misses the point. However, I obviously haven’t convinced this person, which is my job as a writer. So this criticism, while wrong, may be justified.

3. “Oranges” - We get the idea: the children have been left alone. Ending is too easy. This is the story of a girl, age 5, and a boy, age 3, who are left alone for long periods by their mother, who is a drunk. (It was first published on Ramble Underground and is available to read here.) I tried to stay in the girl’s POV, so there’s not much interpretation for the reader. It’s a lot of this happened and this happened. I wanted the reader to have to pay attention. However, I have gotten a comment on this story that there was “too much blocking”: in other words, the rate of revelation was low and there was too much of “she did this and then this and then this.” However, I was hoping a reader would catch the small bread crumbs I was laying out. So this reader thought there was no change in the story. She or he felt I was beating her/him over the head with the same thing. She/he thought it was too long. Also, the ending wasn’t satisfying. I ended it with the mother coming home having just got a job, and she wants the girl to forgive her and everything to be nice, but the girl can’t, as shown by small gestures. By “too easy” I assume she/he meant predictable. Or I hadn’t earned it. Since there was no change over the course of the story, the ending was pat, maybe? This comment does go along with the first story’s comment - ending wasn’t satisfying. (Note - in the first one, there is not enough resolution, but in this one, it’s too easy, so too much resolution?) So, needless to say, I’m still figuring it out.

4. “Change Your Hair” - An idea story, predictable. The title of this story is “Change Your Hair, Change Your Life.” It’s about two sisters whose mother is a hairdresser. It’s in four parts, each an important turning point in these girls’ lives. It’s told sort of from both their points of view. The conceit of doing your hair runs throughout it. (It was first published on Prick of the Spindle and is available to read here.) An idea story - I suppose it is. I started with the idea of the title and tried to run it throughout the portions. So I guess the reader is saying is that it feels contrived and she or he wasn’t pulled into it. Predictable? Hmmmm. In the first part, the mother punished the older sister by chopping off all her hair; in the second, the older sister joins the army; in the third, the older sister kicks out the younger sister’s abusive husband; and in the fourth, the older sister comes home from overseas having been raped. Predictable? I think maybe this objection is about something else. Maybe it’s about craft - I didn’t sufficiently pull this person in.

5. “The Body Animal” - Another idea story, trying to explain anorexia. This is the story of a girl with body dysmorphia. (It’s been published in Talking River, but it isn’t available online.) But I didn’t approach it by thinking, Oh, I know, I’ll tell the story of a girl with body dysmorphia. I wanted to explore how women get disconnected from their bodies at a very early age. So it didn’t feel like just “an idea story” to me. I felt in her body, blow by blow. This comment made me feel like the reader was congratuling her- or himself on being smarter than me having labeled it. Then I thought that maybe that’s what the reader was doing throughout, making themselves feel smarter by dismissing what I was writing. Which made me a little angry.

The final comment was: “Remember that art is not life. Art explains why something happens.” So this reader must have a pretty specific idea of what art is, and what I’m writing is definitely not art, to this person. But, the thing is, for me the whole point is to try to explain the complexity and subtlety of lived existence. I am trying to explain life, and that is the art. I’m not trying to be art-ificial; I’m trying to use the clearest language I can to portray lived experience and make it a satisfying story. This reader needed more interpretation and more “art.”

So, bottom line, this person was not my ideal reader. She or he didn’t like my style nor how I ended things. I didn’t pull them in at all, and they didn’t have a good thing to say about any of it. (There were more stories in the collection they didn’t comment on.) In fact, I think they sort of resented having to read my stories and they dismissed me out of hand.

This all leaves me both slightly angry but also thinking deeply about my craft.

Questions of the Day: I don’t want to dismiss this person if they have valid criticisms, but I don’t want to take them to heart if what they say had no bearing on what I’m trying to do. What do you think?

Strength in What Remains

A rejection on a full of the novel. This one made it pretty far. The agent was so wonderful, so enthusiastic, and I understand why the rejection. Still, pretty heartbreaking.

Rejection

I received a rejection from a litmag today for a story submission. I get lots of rejections, just as every writer does. But I treasure the ones like this that say, “I really enjoyed this. It doesn’t fit our magazine, but send us some more.”

This is a great big thank you to all those tireless readers out there who screen submissions for litmags. No pay, no recognition, just the honor and, hopefully sometimes, the pleasure.