Rejection

MARY HIGGINS CLARK
Back in 1966, the young romance author was trying to sell a story she called “Journey Back to Love.” It didn’t go well, however; her submission to Redbook came back with a rejection from the editors, stating “We found the heroine as boring as her husband had.” Ouch! The piece was eventually run as a two-part serial in an English magazine, and Mary Higgins Clark currently boasts forty-two bestselling novels.

Mental Floss has a list of best-selling authors and their experiences with rejection. I remember being rejected from a paid internship I really wanted when I was a fresh-faced graduate. You get used to seeing rejections when you’re young and starting out, but this one particularly hurt because I had interviewed with four of the senior editors in the office, and had my hopes up. Years later, the same company contacted me and offered me a staff job, which I turned down because I was already happy with what I was doing. Rejection is not the end of the world, though it can feel like it at the time.

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