Do you recall a previous blog post when I was railing against a rude rejection I'd received from a literary agent? It absolutely wasn't the rejection I was cross about, but the dismissive tone of their one line email:
'Many thanks for your email and material but I'm afraid we're going to pass.'
You spend three years writing and rewriting a novel, agonising over it, trying your best to make it precisely what you want it to be, and they send you one dismissive sentence.
| synonyms: | contemptuous, disdainful, scornful, sneering, snide, scathing, disparaging, negative, unenthusiastic, offhand, perfunctory; |
This morning I got another rejection. This is how it should be done.
Dear Sue,
Thank you for giving the xxxxxxx Agency a chance to consider your work. Please accept my apologies for the delay
in responding to your submission.
Whilst I enjoyed reading your opening chapters, I am afraid
that I did not feel quite gripped enough to absolutely fall in love with your
writing.
As an agency, we feel that it is immensely important for new
writers to have an agent who believes completely in the potential of their work
to sell and who can therefore take that enthusiasm to the publishers.
Accordingly, we need to feel really passionate about a writer’s work before we
sign them onto the agency.
We receive nearly 600 manuscripts a week and can only take
on a select number of debut writers every year. The result is that we have to
be incredibly selective. This is an entirely subjective decision and I have no
doubt that another agent will feel differently.
I wish you the very best of luck in finding an agent who is
right for you.
Best wishes,
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