I’ve been querying my romantic horror. I’m up to 14 rejections. I have several still out in the ether, and I had said that I wasn’t going to send anymore, but then an agent who works at an agency that I really like opened to queries, so I sent one. But beyond that, I’m leaning toward self publishing. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. I don’t like waiting and waiting. I no longer feel that heavy deflation feeling when a rejection email comes in, so that’s good. It’s hard to not feel sad for every rejection, and I don’t think there is any way around that, except time and experience.
Yesterday, I saw the reply email come in, and I had this moment where I panicked because I didn’t want it to be a request. It made me realize that I don’t want to go trad publishing. Then I had to sit down and question why, and I think it boils down to me not trusting the industry.
I just don’t like the idea of writing books that I’m told to write, instead of the books I want to write. I also don’t like the direction publishing is taking in terms of AI, and I don’t like the vibe that trad publishing is like trying to sit at the cool kids’ table in high school, you know? Or the vibe that the big houses are only interested in the next big book, and midlist books are being phased out (it’s a conspiracy, I know), but why go trad to be a midlister when I could go indie and be a midlister?
I’ve also been mentally compiling a list of comp covers.
But, I’ve put that project on the backburner for now. I have told myself I won’t think about it or move forward with it until after the holidays.
But I did have an experience this past week on Query Tracker.
While scrolling through the pages on query tracker, I came across a comment. It was a long comment, rather than the usually copy-paste of the form rejection letter, or an author documenting when they sent their query, when they got the form rejection, if it was a request. This comment was LONG.
And it was very confusing. I read it, or tried to read it, because it was a dumpster fire, and the gist (I think) was that this guy was upset that his query was rejection, and not only insulted the agent in his rant but also insulted all the other authors in the comment section in his bitter, spiteful rant, that stemmed – again, I think, because it wasn’t very coherent – that he believed this book was very marketable and would have a big audience, and how dare the agent reject it. He was giving offended man neckbeard energy.
And I commented. I couldn’t help it. Because that behavior is unacceptable.
First, the agents can see their comments. Insulting the agent is not going to get you anywhere. In fact, your name probably has an asterisk by it now, or some other indication so that the agent knows to reject you automatically.
Being bitter and angry and taking to social media to get that out of your system is not a good move. I know it’s tempting, because you want to get your frustration out, you want to connect with others you have felt the same and you want them to tell you that your justificed in your bitterness and anger – but as it’s been said many many times, the publishing industry is small. Word gets around.
Second, also hand in hand with “publishing is small,” don’t insult your fellow authors. It makes other people not like you. I got the sense from this guy’s post that he was insulting the people who got full requests, and tried to demean their books. That’s not the way to go.
Publishing isn’t easy. It’s hard. It’s emotionally taxing. It takes a lot of patience and persistence. There will be rejection. It’s called the query trenches for a reason. The competition for an agent’s attention is steep. The competition to be agented is steep. The competition for an editor is steep. The competition for a reader’s attention is steep. Nothing about this is easy.
I know it’s hard not to take the rejections personally. It’s a hard lesson to learn, because it’s one you have to really learn on your own with experience. We all want to think we’re the exception to the rule, that we’ve written the next big book, that we will get the big contract and the big advance and be able to quit our day job – and we’re not.
It’s pointless to get upset about it. I know, it hurts when you’re not the chosen one, and it’s easy to feel jealous and bitter and all these books that get big advances and big marketing pushes and then you read them and they’re not good. But being bitter and taking it out on other authors is not cool. It’s not going to make you any friends.
