01.19.2008
Rejection number thirty-six is in, people! And we're thrilled. Seriously.
As regular readers of this little column know, last week I sent off five stories for rejection. That was... err... seven days ago.
This morning, on my way out to get measured for some new sport coats, I checked my mailbox because I neglected to yesterday. In there I found my first rejection from Fantasy & Science Fiction. I must have gotten it yesterday because the mailman doesn't come before 4pm. The letter was dated Tuesday. Which means the US Postal Service is much better at their jobs than I ever gave them credit for and that the fine editors at F&SF are freak'n dedicated speed readers.
This brings up an interesting record keeping question for me: do I total my rejection time from the date on the reply letter or do I total it from the date the letter was received? Right now, I have totaled it from the latter but I'm leaning towards the former. I mean, for counting it towards magazine reply time, it seems unfair to hold it against the editor for the time it take the Postal Service to get it to me. But... then again, what if they only drop these things in the mail in batches? And what if I just happened to make the batch?
Hmmm... Maybe I should count it from the post mark on the envelope. The Postal Service, for all their faults, does tend to get a letter from place to place once it's been put into a mailbox. Yeah... that sounds fair!
So... the actual rejection time on this was four days.
I would like to call this a record but the fact is that I had a one day rejection for They Who Cast The First Stone from Apex Digest back in October '06. Still, for a magazine paying pro rates, this is incredible. I look forward to getting rejected from them again.
Why? Well... what they told me was:
Thank you for submitting "Drug Enforcement," but I'm going to pass on it. This tale didn't grab my interest, I'm afraid. Good luck to you with this one, and thanks again for sending it our way.
Wow... that was kind of a nice letter. And the good editor's comma usage is the same as mine. How neat is that?
Well... this makes rejection number five for Drug Enforcement. It was also its first rejection since September. Very cool. When I get my rejection for Ayla Athena from Asimov's I will send it there for, what I hope, will be a simmilarly kind rejection.
And that's all the news that's fit to print.
Have a good weekend.