Interesting Rejection E-mail

So a little over a year ago, I sent my manuscript to Baen Books. It was an older version of my book, back when it was called Mindy Lightbearer. When I look back at that older version of the book, the prose was rough, the characterizations needed work, there was a lot of rough stuff to work out. Nevertheless, I sent the full manuscript to Baen, and it went into their slush pile.

Well, here we are over a year later, and some editor finally picked it out of the slush pile and read it. They rejected it, of course, but they didn't send me a form letter. They actually sent me personal feedback. Here's what the editor said:

Dear Author,

Thank you for your patience as we considered your manuscript. As you can imagine, we receive a great many submissions, but only a small percentage of them are worthy of significant editorial attention. Yours is one of this select group.

Alas, since even a small percentage of the total manuscripts submitted is a very large number, constraints on our time and resources make it impossible for us to respond even to such high-quality submissions as yours with the close and individualized attention they deserve. So please do not take the brief comments below amiss; they are an indication of our highest esteem. On the other hand, please do not take these comments as a request for revisions; they are not. While we think your story has some merit, we really don’t think it would work for us.

Comments:

- Good writing

- Nice job capturing the point of view of a 13-year-old girl

- Story was slower to develop than our readers prefer

We of course wish you the best of luck submitting it to other markets.

Best wishes,

Gray Rinehart

Contributing Editor

Interesting. The one negative, that the story is slow to develop, is something that I addressed in the rewrite. The novel starts off with a bang now, instead of easing into things. I'm surprised at the comment "good writing" because I thought the prose needed a lot of work, and the newest manuscript is a lot better. Anyway, it was fairly positive for a rejection letter, which gives me some hope considering how much better the manuscript is now compared to what they read. I should hear back from Belle Books soon (they said response time is roughly 3 months, and it's been 2 so far).