Rejection doesn't have to hurt

I received another rejection the other day. Nothing new there. But this one had some positives in it.

Hi Ross, we have decided not to use XXX for the XXX anthology. It's a good story with good characters, prose, pacing, etc., and, in fact, was among the final few we selected from the hundreds of stories we received where we'll select the stories that'll go into the anthology.

So it appears that I made the short list out of hundreds received. That is nice to know. After another quick review, it has been sent out to another publication.

The original story was in fact penned some years ago. And it was presented as derivative crap. Not surprisingly, it was rejected. The fact that a revised version of the story has made it down the final shortlist of an international anthology speaks volumes for how much my writing has improved, not least of which being my appreciation of what a story actually is.

I also have several other short stories out with editors at the moment along with a speculative poem and more getting close to being ready to be sent out.

Sadly, my romantic comedy film script has stalled badly. I thought I would have difficulties with the romantic bits but instead it has been the drama that posed problems in scripting. It has been shelved for the moment, but most definitely not forgotten.