Rejectomancy

Level One: Form Rejections

I launched my first short story onto the rejection circuit in Sept. 04. (Wow! Almost a year now.) For the first several months, it rained form rejections. Then I started to get a smattering of these:

Level Two: Helpful, Personal Rejections

For instance, "Nice, but too many adjectives," or "competent, but misses depth." This was stuff to go on, stuff I could use to make my stories better. This was a good level. Alas, came:

Level Three: Unhelpful, Personal Rejections

These rejections are near-misses. They have nothing constructive to say, except of course, "not quite good enough." Some examples from the last month or so:

Although interesting, this story did not appeal to me enough to accept it....I welcome additional work from you.

Nothing really wrong with this story, it just did not stand out enough...feel free to try me again.

Ultimately, however, I found the prose did not quite have the sparkle it needed to push the writing from competent to great...I hope we will see more of your work soon.

*sigh*

I don't know how to fix this except to write more and submit more.

*revises*
*submits*

It's a sad, sad day.

Just now, I sat on my mattress and my butt hit the boxsprings. (This may explain the aching back.)

I've had the dear thing for 10 years. Please, join me in observing a moment of silence.

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Thank you.

*drags to burn pile*
*hums dirge*