First, some exciting news! Cap’n Sweet Valley and I have acquired our first manuscript. Stay tuned for deal news. We’re pretty excited about this (for a number of reasons, possibly differing from each other’s).
Second, some housekeeping news: please, please, PLEASE do not submit your manuscript to me via this website. The New Adult contest was an exception, not a rule. St. Martin’s Press makes it their policy not to accept unagented manuscripts and if we have not contacted you first, please refrain from querying me here. In the future, submit your query through the proper channels. Any submissions I receive through the blog will be rejected. I’m sorry, but I simply cannot consider everything that comes here in fairness to everyone.
Third, a look into rejections, and why we reject manuscripts.
Bigger really is better.
People all about the internets have been posting about why they pass on manuscripts. I thought I’d add my two cents here. Most of the reasons we pass is pretty much the same as everyone else’s.
Not right for our list.
In our case, we receive a lot of really great manuscripts that are unfortunately too YA for us. I know we’ve stirred a lot of excitement within the YA community with our announcement about publishing into the niche above Young Adult, but we are looking to publish adult fiction. I love YA, I really do, but if we publish one, it will have to be a breakout or crossover in some way.
Needs too much work.
This one might sound a little odd coming from an editorial department, but we’ve gotten a few books that were compelling or interesting in some way, but need some major rewriting. Rewriting is different from revising–the former changes the entire book in a significant way, the latter is tightening structure, character motivation, and prose. We don’t want to write the book for you; that’s your job, not ours.
The Usual Suspects: Plot, Character, Writing, Storytelling
You can have one of the four that needs work, sometimes even two of the four and we might be willing to take a chance. I’ve listed the problems in order of importance and/or ease of fixability: plot is the easiest, storytelling is the hardest.
Not good enough.
I hate this one, mostly because I hate writing rejections for it. No one likes to hear something isn’t good enough. But sometimes, that’s really the only answer we have.
Not big enough.
A phrase I’ve been using more and more in my editorial discussions with Cap’n Sweet Valley is that a manuscript is simply “not big enough”. But what does that mean? “Big” doesn’t mean “longer”. “Big” doesn’t necessarily mean “bestseller” either (not that you can predict that). Of course, we’d love to have the next HARRY POTTER or TWILIGHT or THE DA VINCI CODE in our grubby little mitts, but who wouldn’t? This is not the same as “not good enough”, not really.
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