Rejection and why it doesn't kick my ass as much as it used to.

This is what rejection feels like;




This year of querying is my third time. Not first, not second, but third time querying the same WIP. Granted, after the second round of rejections I flipped a poo and rewrote the entire thing, and the result was AWESOME.

A lot of agents talk about the 'practice novel' and how the author will sometimes query it to them. I made that mistake twice, and it killed me. Right now, I'm doing something rather devious and querying the same agents I queried before, but with this shiny new WIP and new query with changed character names.

I'm relying on the fact that agents tend to FORGET a terrible past query. (I hope.) D:

So now that the REAL DEAL of my WIP is done and out there in the query world, I feel pumped. Excited beyond recognition. For the past two query times, I had no confidence in my manuscript at all - I expected all rejections and I mostly got all rejections. But even if Satan came up and slapped me in the face, I wouldn't quaver away from my confidence with this WIP.

So far, the rejection count goes something like this;

Formal Rejection: 3
Partial Requested but Rejected in the End: 1
Haven't heard from yet: 56

Rejection doesn't hurt anymore, but not because I've grown used to it. I have this crazy glowing trust that defies rejection, because the WIP is just that good. It deserves nothing less than getting published, and very soon. I KNOW it will get published, because I can feel it. Hard to describe, but the feeling is there, like a deja vu I've yet to trigger, but know is around.

And when it happens, I'll probably just explode. And throw a party. Not necessarily in that order. Or maybe in that order. I've always wanted to go to a party as a cloud of unrecognizable fleshy bits.