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| You after sticking with it... |
after a two-month hiatus which involved two bruised ribs and a broken collar bone (don't ask), I decided to get back to Floating Robes. In the meantime I've watched loads of movies, loafed around the house and popped my painkillers (what else can you do?)
I've revised some of my older stories and sent them off to the magazines. Alas, so far without any success. I'm not worried, though. And you know why? Because I believe in my stories. They're like my little soldiers that I send out into the world after I drilled them thoroughly into being lean, mean horror machines! And once I've taught them to be independent, self-thinking, beautiful, nasty little gems, I unleash them! Then it's all up to them to wow and beguile those editors and slushpile readers!
Sometimes they do, but most of the times they come back, head hanging and feeling miserable. I leave them for a few days, sulking on the couch, before I send them out again. And every once in awhile they do find a home and I'm oh so proud of them! My little bloody angels with their crooked teeth and scarred cheeks and forked tongues!
What I'm trying to say in my own rambling, round-about way, is that even IF we send our stories off to magazines and we get them back after a two-month wait with a form rejection saying: "Thanks but no thanks," (literally, once) DO NOT FRET. Do not bang you head against the wall, don't slam your fingers in the door, don't despair, don't threaten to jump off the highest building in your beautiful little corner of the world.
Just revise the story, recognize what's wrong with it, fix it and find another market for it. It may take five, ten, sometimes twenty times, but I'm sure that the right one is out there!
And then, when your story appears in some up-market magazine with your name printed in point-48 Helvetica on the cover and a full centerspread interview inside, and it's picked up by some Hollywood hotshot to make it into a full-length critically acclaimed blockbuster film, you can be sure all the other editors will eat their little form rejection slips in agony while the rest of their lifes a little voice in their heads go: "You passed on that, you passed on that...".
Did I mention I developed a taste for coffee while I was out? You may have noticed.
Long story short: DO NOT GIVE UP!
Hm. That's basically all I needed to say, wasn't it.
Thank you for listening.
Marcel
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