Shantell PowellI don’t mind getting rejections for my work, but sometimes when I get a personalized rejection, I am baffled. One story about a magic item was declared “not speculative” (do magical devices exist in that reader’s world?), that hillbilly English is jarring, & that humour doesn’t go with stories about angels and gods (I guess they don’t like Good Omens). Not my target readers, but it rankles that these are the folks gatekeeping grant money. #WritingLife #WritingGrants #WritingCommunity
FWIW, these same stories are adored by my beta readers and mentors.
Peculiar Susan@Shanmonster I don’t know what’s worse, ghosting or feedback like that.
@Sjb127 yeah. Kinda wondering that, too.
Janis La Couvée@Shanmonster argh - gate keepers. The worst. They may not be your target readers but these reasons for rejection seem petty.
@lacouvee I worry when the grant trustees are not approving nonstandard English. That excludes a lot of writers and stories.
@Shanmonster it does. There is a lot of debate about who gets to write in nonstandard English, too. Is it appropriation? Or stylistically authentic. Would WP Kinsella be able to write what he wrote then, today? As opposed to the Dead Dog Café by Thomas King - I loved the vernacular in that radio show.
@lacouvee i grew up in the back woods and some of the stories I write use the dialect folks spoke there. It’s not so different from the way people speak in old westerns, so I’m not sure why they’re balking at it. My beta readers are not having issues with it.
@Shanmonster I'm sure it's perfectly readable. Strange that they would balk