Surviving 700 Rejections
Last week, I hit another significant submission milestone. I received my 700th rejection since I started tracking them on Duotrope back in 2012. If you’ve been following my blog for any length of time, you know that when I hit a big round number like this, I like to take a deep dive into the stats and see what they can tell me. So, let’s do that. š
First and Last
First up, let’s establish exactly how long I’ve been tracking all these no’s, not for us’s, and we’re gonna pass’s.
The first rejection I entered into Duotrope came on May 5th, 2012. The rejected story was “Feeding Time” and the rejecting market was Daily Science Fiction.Ā The story was okay, and I did shop it around a bit after that, but I never found a home for it, and it now resides in the digital trunk where just-okay stories go to die. The market, Daily Science Fiction, is now sadly on indefinite hiatus, and was a market I tried unsuccessfully to crack for over a decade.Ā
The last rejection, number 700, I received on March 16th, 2025. The story is a new one called “Love in the Time of Giardia” and it was rejected on it’s maiden submission by The Colored Lens.Ā It’s a weird little story that I might struggle to place, but The Colored LensĀ had some good feedback, so I’ll look to revise this piece and keep trying.
Stories and Markets
Now let’s look at how many distinct stories I’ve had rejected and from how many markets.Ā
Stories: I’ve had 159 distinct stories rejected. Of those 159, I’ve gone on to sell 76 of them, so roughly half. Additionally, fifteen of the rejected stories are out on currently out on submission, and five of them are currently being held for further consideration. So, I like my chances for finding homes for some of these oft-rejected stories. Currently, my most rejected stories, each with twenty-five total,Ā are “Set in Stone” and “Time Has No Memory”. I’ve retired “Set in Stone” but “Time Has No Memory”Ā has received half-a-dozen close-but-no-cigar rejections, and I believe I’ll eventually find it a home (I hope). Just for funsies here are my top ten most-rejected stories.
| Story | Rejections | Published? |
| Hell to Pay – Installment Plans Available! | 12 | Yes |
| Coffin Shopping | 13 | |
| Caroline | 15 | Yes |
| The Downer | 16 | Yes |
| The Scars You Keep | 16 | Yes |
| Trapping Disaster | 17 | |
| Paper Cut | 18 | Yes |
| Signs and Wonders | 18 | |
| Set in Stone | 25 | |
| Time Has No Memory | 25 |
As you can see, I’ve managed to sell five of my ten most-rejected pieces, and by the number of hold letters and close-but-no-cigar rejections received by “Trapping Disaster”, “Signs and Wonders”, and “Time Has No Memory”, I think I’ll eventually sell them as well. “Coffin Shopping” is a maybe. It’s a good story, but it’s setting and subject make it a hard sell. “Set in Stone” is a piece of what you might call juvenilia (I wrote it a long time ago), and it’s just not good enough for prime time; it’ll stay in the trunk where it belongs.
Markets: I have had the pleasure, nay the privilege, of getting rejected by 180 distinct markets. Many of these markets have since published my work, but I’m still knocking at the door of many more, especially some of the most vaunted pro outfits. Of my nineteen currently pending submissions, thirteen of them are with markets I’ve yet to publish with. Five of those thirteen submissions have been held for further consideration, so, you know, fingers crossed. Again, for shits and giggles, here are the ten markets that have rejected me the most.
| Publisher | Rejections | Acceptances |
| The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (F&SF)Ā | 17 | 0 |
| Flame Tree PressĀ | 20 | 5 |
| Factor Four MagazineĀ | 21 | 4 |
| The Dark MagazineĀ | 21 | 0 |
| Daily Science FictionĀ | 24 | 0 |
| NewMyths.comĀ | 24 | 1 |
| Apex MagazineĀ | 26 | 0 |
| The ArcanistĀ | 31 | 16 |
| Flash Fiction OnlineĀ | 38 | 0 |
| The Molotov CocktailĀ | 52 | 17 |
For simplicity’s sake, I’ve combined all of a publisher’s individual journals, contests, anthologies, and other projects under a single listing. So, for example, Flame Tree Press includes the Flame Tree Fiction Newsletter and all their various anthologies. Like my most-rejected stories, I’ve managed to crack five of my most-rejected markets. I’ve gotten very close with Flash Fiction Online, making it to their final round of deliberation a handful of times. I’ve made it out of the slush pile with Apex, but not much further. I like my chances of eventually cracking those two, and I’ll keep trying. Of course, my chances of appearing in the pages (digital or print) of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction or Daily Science Fiction are pretty much zero at this point because both are on hiatus. Sadly, The Arcanist, which used to be my go-to for slightly humorous spec-fic stories, is also on indefinite hiatus.
Types of Rejections
I used to keep careful track of the type of rejections I received, even going so far as to separate form rejection into standard and higher-tier, but I’ve stopped doing that. It’s not that I don’t believe that higher-tier form rejections exist–they do–it’s just often difficult to tell which is which, and, in the grand scheme of things, I’m not sure it matters that much. Now, I only pay attention to personal rejections with some kind of feedback or shortlist/close-but-no-cigar rejections, as they can actually help me crack a market on my next submission. But, here’s the general breakdown of all 705 rejections.
- Form Rejections: 556
- Personal Rejections: 134
- Shortlist Rejections: 37
You’ll notice the math doesn’t quite add up here, and it looks like I have 727 rejections instead of 705. That’s because some of the form and personal rejections are also shortlist rejections. In truth, I think I might actually have more shortlist rejections than the 37 I have listed here, but there wasn’t an option to mark submissions as shortlisted Duotrope until fairly recently. If I had to guess, I’d say that maybe a third or a bit more of the form rejections are higher-tier form rejections, but, again, it doesn’t really matter that much.
Lessons and What’s Next
So, what has 700+ rejections taught me over the past decade and change? Quite a lot, actually, and I think there are two primary lessons every writer should take away from rejection. Here they are.
One, rejections are inevitable. No matter how good you are, not matter how perfect a match your story seems to be for a particular market, you WILL get rejected, and the more you submit, the more rejections you’ll receive. You have to accept the reality of rejections in the same way you accept the reality of bad weather. It’s gonna happen and there’s not much you can do about it. But, like any force of nature, rejections aren’t personal (though they might feel like they are), and though it’s okay to get upset when you receive a tough rejection, the more you get, the less you feel them.
Two, even good stories get rejected. If you take anything away from the mess of stats I posted, it should be that. Out of 100-plus stories I’ve sold, a good ninety percent of them were rejected at least once, and most were rejected quite a bit more. In fact, I’ve done the math, and every story I’ve sold receives four rejections on average before an acceptance. It’s even worse when you look at short stories (as opposed to flash fiction) where I average almost EIGHT rejections per acceptance. In other words, don’t get discouraged by one rejection, or hell, fifteen. An acceptance happens when you put the right story in front of the right editor at the right time. Miss any one of those, and no matter how good the story is, it’s gonna get rejected. Keep. Trying.
As for what’s next, well, I’ve renewed my focus on submitting short stories this year and set some lofty goals for myself. First, I’m aiming to write one new story per week. Then, I want to send 150 submissions, and receive twenty-four acceptances, twelve of them with pro markets. So far, I’m on track, and I’m already racking up the rejections. If things progress like they have been, you should see an 800-rejections post around this time next year.
Happy writing. š
One Comment on “Surviving 700 Rejections”
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Aeryn Rudel's Rejectomancy 
Another great anecdote and advice. We all face those massive rejections (which hopefully lead to acceptances). I also use Duotrope (love it), though not as long as you have been, I’m only in my second year of using it to track my submissions.
I have my fair share of rejections (many from long before Duotrope), and a nice handful of acceptances. It’s easy to get dejected, but whenever I think about it, I remind myself that 12 publishers turned down “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” before Rowling was ever successful.