by Conny Manero

Created on: October 29, 2008

So you got a rejection letter, or even a few rejection letters, so what? Every writer has probably heard the story about the author who used his rejection letters to wallpaper his office. The question is, are you going to follow his example, not give up, and keep on writing?

I'm not saying that it's going to be easy. Someone once said, "It doesn't matter how many times you get beaten down, what matters is how many times you get up." Even though this saying has its origins in the sport of boxing, the words can be applied to anything where we present our body, or our writing, to another as a target or for a subjective opinion. We have to be strong enough to absorb the punch or accept the criticism if we ever hope to improve our skills.

Whether it is a novel, a short story or poetry, in your opinion you created a beautiful piece of work. You put your heart and your soul into it and you spent hours perfecting it. When you thought perfection had been reached, (or when you were sick and tired of reading the same thing over and over again), you started looking for a publisher. Only to discover that publishers' websites announce "We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts". No, this doesn't make sense; but it does become your first obstacle to overcome.

More of your research reveals that in order to be considered by a publisher, a writer needs a literary agent. So you contact a literary agent, or even a few agents, and eagerly awaited their response. Only, the agents are less than enthusiastic. Your carefully typed query letter was responded to with, "Thanks, but no thanks", "Not for us", "Not interested", or worse, you got no response at all.

When finally, finally, an agent responds to you with the request to see part or the whole of your manuscript, you jump for joy! At last you have a fish on the line. But a few days later, the agent responds that, after careful consideration, he is not going to represent you. It seems that your material is not what he was looking for after all.

You feel defeated. You feel beaten down. And this is the moment where it gets tricky. What are you going to do now? Are you going to give up, or will you pick up your pen, (or boot up your computer), and carry on writing?

In my case, the best way to get motivated to write again is going to a bookstore. Seeing all those hundreds of books, neatly stacked on well lit shelves, immediately makes me wonder-what if they had given up? How many of these authors were accepted with their first query letter? How many agents did they contact before one of them decided to take a chance on them?

If asked, they would probably laugh and say that their work was rejected quite a few times too. That sometimes they wanted to give up. But they didn't. And that is the key-perseverance. Remember, "It doesn't matter how many times you get beaten down, what matters is how many times you get up."

So long as a writer keeps submitting their precious manuscript, there is the chance of it being published.

So long as a writer keeps contacting agents, they might get that much sought after letter offering a contract.

So long as a writer keeps on fighting to become a published author-there is hope.

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