The Journey to Rejection (aka A Writer's Journey)

I’ve seen a lot of posts lately about rejection, and the struggles writers have had to be published. In an era when self-publishing seems to be all the rage, and a dozen new technologies are changing the writing world on a daily basis, traditional publishing seems to remain the ultimate goal for many authors.

Yeah, me too.

Once upon a time, no other choice existed. I am just old enough to be part of that reality. Oh, I started out with a bang. My first biographical essay—a look at my great-great-great-grandfather’s Civil War experience—hit the presses when I was all of eighteen. The author photo the paper used was my junior school picture. I celebrated. I was on my way!

Then . . . nothing. For NINE years . . . nothing. Oh, I wrote. Daily. I submitted frequently. I have more than 300 unsold short stories, all written during that time, and multiple rejections on each one. But when I finally sold one of those stories—ah, sky rockets! That 84-dollar check meant I was the next big thing!

Well . . . maybe not. The second sale was still two years away. I had a day job. Then a child. I wrote . . . some. I tried my hand at screenwriting and even won an award and got my first agent. I had dreams of breaking into the film industry.

Then came the divorce. And I wrote not a word for five years. Nada. I finally reconnected with a friend in publishing and pitched a devotional to her. She didn’t want the one I had, but hired me to write a different one.

Once again . . . silence followed.

Then came a movie that lit a fire under my rear. The Matrix. Groundbreaking in a lot of ways, what it did for me was to remind me of all the things I loved that I’d let slip away. I dove back into them. And the combination broke a block that I didn’t even realize I had. I finished a science fiction novella, which got some editorial attention but never sold. I branched out and finished a historical romance novella, which sold to a digital publisher who was way ahead of her time—it sold no copies to consumers.

More rejections. LOTS of rejections. I turned to magazines and sold a few feature articles. But I received even more rejections. At that point, my rejection count was up over 500 of those silly form letters.

So WHY did I keep trying? Because I’m a writer. It’s my mindset. It’s my calling. It’s in my blood. If I don’t write, I go nuts.

In 2005, finally, things began to turn around. I sold two novels. Then a third. But I struggled to sell the next ones. Rejections abounded. I signed with my second agent, so she got to handle the rejections—and I still get them.

For me, thirty years passed between my first sale and the time my writing career did more than stall. But I now have written and sold more than ten books, and I’m working with my third agent.

I still get rejected.

Do NOT let rejections discourage you. The more you write, the more you’ll receive. It’s part of the business.

But the business is NOT about the rejections. It’s about the message, the stories God has placed on your heart. It’s about honoring His gift to you. It’s about giving all of that—the gift, the stories—a voice, and letting them be heard. 

It's about the writing. Always.