So some time back—just over 14 years ago, in fact!*—I posted a series of communications I had in the early 1990s with the now-defunct comic book publisher Eclipse, in which I was working with an editor who was really, really interested in publishing some of my comic book proposals. Like, really interested. Like, it was practically a done deal, you know? Practically. The fact that you have never seen my comic books in a drugstore or newstand near you might tell you exactly how that worked out, but in case you are interested in the details, you can read about it here, and here, and here, and also here.
Continue reading “By Request: The Envelope, Please!”Category: Rejection Letters
Random Rejection: The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, “The Light”
So this week I consulted the Gods of Randomness and they instructed me to reach into my big file of rejection letters and pull item #9 out of folder “F”. There aren’t a lot of papers in this folder, and there would be even fewer if I had decided to file rejections from The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction under “M” instead of under “F”, but for whatever reason I went into the prepositional clause to sort this one. I know I sent a lot of stuff to F &SF (none of which was accepted) and there are only three rejection slips from them under “F”, so maybe I was inconsistent and there are more under “M”. We’ll find out at some point I guess.
Continue reading “Random Rejection: The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, “The Light””Random Rejection: Maelstrom Magazine, “Love and the Tides of Darkness”
It’s been a while since I reached into my giant stack of rejection letters, so I decided it was time to consult the Gods of Randomness to see which section and document I should pull out and scan for everyone’s edification. This week, they chose the letter “M” and the eighth position, which is somewhat appropriate, since that rejection was for a short story called “Love and the Tides of Darkness” (hereafter “LatToD”) that I originally wrote specifically for an anthology called On the Eighth Day, the theme of which was something to the effect of “What happened after the end of the beginning of the Old Testament?”, or something like that. (Hey, it was a long time ago, I don’t remember exactly.) In a nutshell, the concept of “LatToD” is that, near the end of the 20th Century, a potential new Savior of Mankind is born. Heaven sends an angel to guard him, and Hell sends a demon to assassinate him; but the angel and the demon turn out to have been romantic partners, back before The Fall, and they end up getting so sidetracked in squabbling with each other that neither one of them carries out their mission, leaving said potential Savior to go ahead and completely screw up his life all on his own.
Continue reading “Random Rejection: Maelstrom Magazine, “Love and the Tides of Darkness””Random Rejections: Welsh Publishing Group
So this week I decided to ask the Gods of Randomness to pick a folder and position in my vast trove of rejection (and a few acceptance) letters, and lo! They told me I should look in the folder labeled “W” and find the seventh item therein, which, as it turns out, was in fact two items stapled together. Here’s the first one:
Continue reading “Random Rejections: Welsh Publishing Group”Random Rejectance: “Storyteller” Magazine
So since last week I posted a rather depressing update on my Blue Roses progress, I figured that this week, I would cheer everyone up by dipping into my vast pile of rejection letters. 😁👍
On this occasion, the Gods of Randomness told me I should look in the “S” folder of my expandable file, which, as you can imagine based on the prevalence of “S” in the English language is one of the more well-populated ones. And what should I find on top in that section but two letters from the Canadian magazine Storyteller, of which one was, as expected, a rejection, but the other was one of those rarer beasts, an acceptance. So in the interest of inducing a little mood whiplash, I scanned them both. First, let’s do the rejection:
Continue reading “Random Rejectance: “Storyteller” Magazine”Random, Uh, Brochure: The Scott Meredith Literary Agency
So this week I beseeched the Gods of Randomness to tell me what to pull out of my vast trove of rejection letters, and they told me, Lo! Thou must pick the sixth item in the folder for the letter M! So that’s what I did. But it’s not a rejection letter. It’s not even a form letter. It is, essentially, a brochure—an unsolicited submission, if you will—from the Scott Meredith Literary Agency:
Continue reading “Random, Uh, Brochure: The Scott Meredith Literary Agency”Random Rejection: Indigenous Fiction, “Leech Field”
So this week, the Gods of Randomness told me to reach into my giant collection of rejection letters and pull something out of the section labeled “I”. Well, okay, they originally told me to pull something out of the section labeled “P”, but all the good stuff in the “P” section has already been done already. Could it be I’m running out of rejection letters?! Nah, there just weren’t that many magazines whose name started with “P”.
Continue reading “Random Rejection: Indigenous Fiction, “Leech Field””Random Rejection: Epitaph, “Trailblazing”
So this week I reached into my vast trove of rejection letters, as directed by the Gods of Randomness, and pulled out this short rejection, from the old magazine Epitaph, a division of Pirate Writings:
Continue reading “Random Rejection: Epitaph, “Trailblazing””Random Rejection: Glimpses Magazine, “The Magician’s Finger”
So this week I fired up good old Random.org and had it pick a letter of the alphabet and a position, and thus I reached into my vast trove of rejection (and a few acceptance) letters and pulled out this little gem, from when I submitted a story called “The Magician’s Finger” to a magazine called Glimpses:
Continue reading “Random Rejection: Glimpses Magazine, “The Magician’s Finger””Random Rejection: Dark Regions, “The Last Vacancy”
Realizing it has been a long, long time since I did a random rejection, this week, I decided to fire up the old random number generator and reach into the old accordion file of denials (and the occasional acceptance). This time I was told to take the 26th rejection from the “D” folder, and so here we have this one, from Dark Regions magazine (which is still around, and is now the specialty book publisher Dark Regions Press), for my short story “The Last Vacancy”:
Continue reading “Random Rejection: Dark Regions, “The Last Vacancy””
Viscosity 