I thought I'd seen something like that somewhere...

And thus Google is my friend.

Apparently, at least for F&SF Magazine, certain things in the rejection letter do mean things:

As I've learned recently on the F&SF forum, the phrasing does indeed mean something, when coming from JJA. "Didn't grab me" means "didn't get past the first five pages" (he always tries to read at least five pages), "didn't hold my interest" means "read more than 5 but didn't reach the end" and "didn't quite work for me" means "I finished it, but didn't think it was good enough to pass to Gordon." (With thanks to J Schoffstall who posted this interpretation, to which JJA agreed.)

I've gotten two rejections from F&SF. The one for the GargoyleFic was from John Joseph Adams (the assistant editor). The one for the BeagleFic was from Gordon Van Gelder himself--so...I'm thinking this means that one made it past JJA's desk and onto Gordon's.

AND...just found this gem: JJA says that not every story gets a "there was some nice writing here," so that's a good too.

Huh. I think I feel a little better now. One of my stories made it past JJA to Gordon's desk, and the other has "some nice writing." I'll take it.

I thought I'd seen something like that somewhere...

And thus Google is my friend.

Apparently, at least for F&SF Magazine, certain things in the rejection letter do mean things:

As I've learned recently on the F&SF forum, the phrasing does indeed mean something, when coming from JJA. "Didn't grab me" means "didn't get past the first five pages" (he always tries to read at least five pages), "didn't hold my interest" means "read more than 5 but didn't reach the end" and "didn't quite work for me" means "I finished it, but didn't think it was good enough to pass to Gordon." (With thanks to J Schoffstall who posted this interpretation, to which JJA agreed.)

I've gotten two rejections from F&SF. The one for the GargoyleFic was from John Joseph Adams (the assistant editor). The one for the BeagleFic was from Gordon Van Gelder himself--so...I'm thinking this means that one made it past JJA's desk and onto Gordon's.

AND...just found this gem: JJA says that not every story gets a "there was some nice writing here," so that's a good too.

Huh. I think I feel a little better now. One of my stories made it past JJA to Gordon's desk, and the other has "some nice writing." I'll take it.

*wibbles*`

I just checked my spam folder and my crit for CatFeet is in from Bob Defendi. He says there's something wrong with it on a structural level that's hard to pin down. But he also said:

This is good. Structure can be learned. Learning to write competently is much harder in my opinion.

I haven't dived into the detailed crit yet. Will do so now...

ETA: AHA. That's what's wrong with that scene. The entire thing was a POV violation; the cat doesn't refer to people by their names. *facepalms and fixes*

*wibbles*`

I just checked my spam folder and my crit for CatFeet is in from Bob Defendi. He says there's something wrong with it on a structural level that's hard to pin down. But he also said:

This is good. Structure can be learned. Learning to write competently is much harder in my opinion.

I haven't dived into the detailed crit yet. Will do so now...

ETA: AHA. That's what's wrong with that scene. The entire thing was a POV violation; the cat doesn't refer to people by their names. *facepalms and fixes*

Er, oops.

So, I just pulled out the F&SF rejection I got for the BeagleFic, and it was actually a "didn't grab me" from JJA.

*embarrassed cough*

Er, oops.

So, I just pulled out the F&SF rejection I got for the BeagleFic, and it was actually a "didn't grab me" from JJA.

*embarrassed cough*

Oh. Em. Gee.

So, someone IMs me out of the blue. This happens on occasion. This person types like she's twelve years old but claims 39. And her username is something that looks like a teenybopper trying for shock effect. Okay, whatever. We get to talking a little about Buffy in S6, and then she makes a completely inappropriate comment:

( Cut for grossness. )

WHO DOES THAT??? Since when is acceptable to make a remark like that to a perfect stranger in a chat window?

*bleaches brain*

And yes, for the record, if it had been a guy I would have slapped him down even harder than I slapped her down. TMI, people!

Oh. Em. Gee.

So, someone IMs me out of the blue. This happens on occasion. This person types like she's twelve years old but claims 39. And her username is something that looks like a teenybopper trying for shock effect. Okay, whatever. We get to talking a little about Buffy in S6, and then she makes a completely inappropriate comment:

( Cut for grossness. )

WHO DOES THAT??? Since when is acceptable to make a remark like that to a perfect stranger in a chat window?

*bleaches brain*

And yes, for the record, if it had been a guy I would have slapped him down even harder than I slapped her down. TMI, people!