I finally received my first rejection yesterday, and it was honestly something of a relief. Obviously, as a writer, you would love for every reaction to your work to be positive, but here at the beginning it is nice to simply know that someone is out there on the other end of this arduous query process.
Some might ask why I would post anything less than an effusively positive review of my work on my own site, and it is a valid question. After all, I certainly don’t want to suggest to potential agents that my book is being turned down left and right (it’s not), but I think everyone knows this is a process with a lot more nos than yeses in it.
That a particular agent on a particular day did not seeing exactly what they were currently looking for is certainly not an indictment of my work. I know I have a good story here, and I also know it isn’t going to be the right story for everyone, so I am not afraid to tip my hand and offer a glimpse at the challenging part of the process. That said, if they start stacking up I’ll probably keep that to myself.
I am using this section of my site to mark milestones along the road of my writing journey. I hope that someday it will be largely dedicated to fending off questions about the release dates of upcoming sequels, but for now the milestones are of a more mundane variety. Anyone who clicks through to this point is looking to come along on the trip, and I hope to give them a little taste of the good and the bad.
Rejection is part of the game, and it is a part I feel uniquely prepared to handle. After all, I spent years in various startup companies and no one in the world delivers as harsh a no as a potential investor.