There are things writers do: eat, dream, write if the muse is good to us – and handle rejection. The last is frequently painful, but it’s a writer’s occupational hazard. Every writer, from beginner to the literary greats, gets those demoralizing emails. While the following suggestions can’t take away the hurt left by literary rejection, these tips may help keep you on track.
Deal with your feelings.
After a rejection letter, it’s normal to experience sadness. Denying feelings can be damaging, so feel free to wallow about in misery for a short time, and then do something positive.
Talk to other writers.
Give yourself a peptalk.
Write about it.
Have a jog.
Create a treat and consume it.
Dance.
Indulge for a while then pull yourself together and move on.
Research psychologists advise us to talk to about ourselves with kindness. Speaking or writing encouragingly to yourself can have a positive impact on your ability to recover quickly from a rejection. The research of Ethan Kross, a psychologist at the University of Michigan shows that “distanced self-talk” helps people to separate the rejection from themselves. He also shows how.
“Imagine that a friend comes to you after a rejection,” Kross said. “You’d say, ‘You got one rejection. You’ve got to move on. There will be plenty of other opportunities for you.’” He’s said that it helps when people think and use self-talk about themselves in the same friendly way with non-first-person pronouns. Instead of thinking, I was rejected, I must suck, use narration in the second-person—“Ellen, you don’t suck”—or in the third person to write about yourself. Any mode of communication used to get this information across can sort of trick your brain into rational, objective thinking. Kross mentioned there’s evidence that “distanced self-talk” helps people cope with rejection.
Accept that rejection is a way of life.
Don’t dwell on this thought, just be aware that it happens. Dealing with rejection is part of life, this goes for all the arts. Actors deal with this often.
Hearing “No” can be demoralizing, especially if you are certain that the editor or agent is a good fit. At times, a rejection can be an eye-opener, helping you for the better–work or career-wise.
A rejection email from editors and agents is better than silence. Sometimes pitches go unanswered, even after a follow-up. Editors and agents don’t have a lot of spare time but, if possible, it would be wonderful to get a short note of encouragement, even if it’s a “You write well, but your manuscript isn’t a good fit for us at this time.” That extra step means a lot.
Handling rejection and self-worth.
Writer Michelle Tea suggests, “Try not to over-identify with your creative work. It can feel like if somebody doesn’t like your work, then they don’t like you. But your work is this mysterious thing that comes out of you. It’s your job to serve it, help it, and then let it go and move on to your next thing.”
Your rejected work is not you. The writer’s journey is filled with bumps in the road. Believe in you and work out the rest.
Literary taste is subjective. Don’t let one person’s thoughts on your work get you down. Do more homework and find another agent or editor. Consider submitting to an agent/editor with a smaller list of authors.
Dealing with rejection is a numbers game.
Getting published really is a numbers game. It’s important to be persistent. Some people will like your work, others won’t. There are many tales of a book being turned down by multiple publishers, eventually finding a home, and go on to become successful.
Change rejection to motivation.
Do you feel that the agent or editor who rejected your manuscript is wrong? Channel that energy to start on a new and improved campaign to send your work to new agents.
Don’t anger the editor/agent.
Be the writer who is remembered for good reasons. Do not upset the person who someday may be able to help launch your career. Don’t argue or insult them if they reject you. That’s a great way to get blocked or ghosted.
Editor Chris Monks wrote that he’ll get pushback on rejections he sends out. Rather than engaging the angry writer, he places “these mean messages in a folder I’ve titled ‘Jerks’ and occasionally share screenshots of them (with the names of the jerks redacted) to my followers on Twitter.”
Get back in that seat and write.
After the emotional bruising of rejection is past, get back to writing. Prepare to create.
Rejection can be viewed as an opportunity to learn from your mistakes and become a better writer. Ponder what may have gone wrong with your work and find what can be improved.
How is your narration-dialogue ratio? Find a good balance of description and chatting.
Did you focus too much on the plot and not fully develop your characters?
What about head-hopping? Be careful with the Point of View!
Did you put your content out before it was ready? There is no rush.
Were there plenty of eyes-on your work? Critique groups/partners are invaluable.
When you’ve found areas needing improvement, do what you need to do so they don’t cause you grief in future projects—increasing your probability of success.
Try to be positive.
Try to look at the situation positively. Consider your writing and focus on how to improve.
What did the reader/agent/publisher/ not like about my project?
How can I make my work more interesting?
While not easy, thinking about these issues and learning to take constructive criticism will make you a better writer and help you to develop a “thicker skin,” something we all need to work on to some degree.
Keep moving forward.
You cannot publish unless you send out the work, beginning with query letters. No one is going to come knocking on your door. That’s your job until someone says, “Who’s there?” If someone does knock on your door it is likely a predatory publisher. There are many who are eager to separate a writer from their funds.
Every writer gets rejected. Every famous author started out dealing with the aftermath the of the “not right for us” or “I signed a book just like yours last week.” Here’s an article about best-selling authors who were initially rejected. It’s a common problem.
The “not right for us” doesn’t mean the book is unworthy. It’s likely that the agent doesn’t have a buyer for the book at that particular point in time. Keep writing and don’t give up hope.
Literary taste is subjective. Don’t let one person’s rejection of your work demoralize you. Do your due diligence and find another agent or editor.
“This manuscript of yours that has just come back from another editor is a precious package. Don’t consider it rejected. Consider that you’ve addressed it ‘to the editor who can appreciate my work’ and it has simply come back stamped ‘Not at this address’. Just keep looking for the right address.” — Barbara Kingsolver
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About Ellen
Author, speaker, and former teacher, Ellen L. Buikema has written non-fiction for parents, and The Adventures of Charlie Chameleon chapter book series with stories encouraging the development of empathy—sprinkling humor wherever possible. Her Works in Progress are The Hobo Code, YA historical fiction and The Crystal Key, MG Magical Realism/ Sci-Fi, a glaze of time travel.
I started writing category romance for Harlequin/Mills and Boon in 2019 with my first book published in 2020. Twenty-five plus books and online reads later, I still get the following question all the time: What is category romance? Usually they immediately follow up with: Okay, but why would you write that? The answer to the first question is in the next section, but before I answer that, I have to address the second.
I fell in love with category romance as a teen. I snuck them off my mother’s and grandmother’s shelves (though today’s category does not look like the ones I read under my covers with a flashlight).
Category Romances are what I like to call mental candy. Their whole purpose is to make the reader feel good. Yes, there are suspense categories, and you might jump off your seat a bit, but when you read that last page, you are satisfied. Everyone in the story is happily loved up.
Some big names either started in category romance or still add category books to their impressive list of publications. Nora Roberts, Maisey Yates, Jeannie Lin, Farrah Rochon, Teri Wilson and many others. I will admit that seeing my books on shelves or in ads from Harlequin with some of these ladies was more than a dream come true.
What Category Romance is? And where it exists in trad and indie publishing.
Honestly, the best way to think of category is a romance book not just with a central romance focus (part of the romance genre requirement) but as a romance book taken down to its core—the romance between the main characters. This is the only real focus of the book. Everything else is a distant second.
These books have tight word counts. Most are between 50k and 55k; though there is some wiggle room based on which category you are in. The side characters that are a staple in longer romances (called Single Title) are largely absent. There might be a quirky best friend who runs a coffee shop, but she, or he, is window dressing. No real substance. Everything is drilled in on the main character’s path to happily ever after.
Traditional
The other thing that makes a category romance a category romance are the requirements for the line you are publishing in. Each category line has requirements around the main characters, location, and heat level expected. At its heart, these requirements are promises you are making to the reader.
The biggest name in category romance is my publisher, Harlequin/Mills and Boon. But they are not the only name in the game. Tule Publishing has lines dedicated to locations in the US and more than one of their romances has hit the television screen. Entangled Publishing also has submissions open for their category lines.
Indie
Category works in indie publishing, too. You might not see it marketed as category romance; though a quick search in Amazon generates multiple indie stories mixed in with the trad published books. Why does it work in indie? Because category at its heart is all about meeting reader expectations. So, if you are reliably delivering a short and spicy mafia romance or a lovely cowboy romance or any other consistent short romance type to your readers, you are writing a form of category romance!
Meeting the reader’s expectations
All genre fiction requires you to meet reader expectations. Write a cozy mystery and don’t have your mystery solved? Watch how fast the knifes come out. Romance requires a happily ever after or happily for now ending. It is the promise you are giving your reader.
Category takes the happily ever after requirement and layers in the line requirements. If you pick up a Harlequin Medical or a Tule Montana Born, you know you are getting your happily ever after plus medical professionals or a story set in the hills and ranches of Montana. The reader goes for exactly what they want.
When I write for Harlequin Medical, the main characters must be in the medical field (or veterinarians) but I have wiggle room in location. I’ve set stories in teaching hospitals in large cities and in the Alaskan outback, with two doctors doing their best to serve a community in a harsh winter environment. Medicals also have a large heat difference, so while mine are on the higher heat level, others have no on page intimacy. The Romance Line is all about wealth and fantasy. The locations need to scream power, wealth and privilege, as do the characters. Like the medical line, there is a range of sensuality levels.
You can find the requirements for each Harlequin/Mills and Boon category at this link. Tule is located here and Entangled here. Remember, these are not suggestions, they are requirements. And that is fine because readers eat them up.
Crafting your own story. No, I am not talking about following formulas.
So you’ve found a category romance line that calls to you. You understand the basic line requirements. Now what?
Category romance follows the same romance beats as single title romance, just in a much tighter word count.
Intro to the main characters
A meet cute
The moment where they can no longer go their separate ways
Your main characters grow together, and it looks like everything will work out
But before that growth finishes, they fall back into their old ways (a little)
The black moment: where our main characters fear all hope is lost
Finally, the grand gesture where our main characters proclaim their love and live happily ever after
The best resource I have ever found for reader expectations in romance is, Romancing the Beat, by Gwen Hayes.
But Juliette the heading says you aren’t talking about formulas!
I’m not. There is no formula for a category romance, or any other genre fiction, books. But there are reader expectations or beats, if you are a Save the Cat Writes a Novel fan.
The world is still very much your oyster. As a medical romance author I have stories with a secret prince OBGYN, a former child actress turned GP, a doctor who moved into the research lab and runs into his former college boyfriend, an emergency doctor at the South Pole—my newest release.
In the Romance line, I have a princess lottery that starts with the prince drawing her name out of a giant glass bowl. Book two in that series (yep, you can do series in category romance) has the king choosing his queen by yanking her name out of a hat. Well, technically her sister’s name, but still.
The story possibilities are literally limitless! That is one of the reasons I fell so hard for category romance as a reader. And it is the reason that I continue to come back to the lines as a writer over and over again.
Drop any questions you have in the comment section below. Added bonus, tell me an over-the-top or just regular romance idea you have and I will see which category line I can slide it into.
Opportunity:
Someone who answers the bonus will win free registration to Category Romance: Writing Short for the Win, my August 4-29th email class on crafting your very first category romance where we really dive into how to make the magic happen. Tomorrow afternoon I’ll have random-org draw a name and post it at the end of the comments — so check back then, because class will start soon!
About Juliette
Juliette Hyland has written more than twenty-five books for Harlequin/Mills & Boon, Imprints of Harper Collins. She's given workshops around the country, in person and via Zoom, on writing craft. Her favorite topic of all time is writing tropes - she always finds ways to sneak it into conversations. Her favorite question for authors - why?
Some stories stick with us more than others, and why? The characters. They feel so real. How they view life, the way they interact with others, the beliefs that steer them and their reactions to setbacks…it somehow all rings true.
They might be nothing like us. We may not agree with their choices. But even when they mess up, their behavior makes sense. It’s because their motives and actions are consistent with who they are, making it easy for us to understand them. We feel like we’re spending time with a real person, not a character in a book. That’s the power of authenticity!
Authentic Characters Behave Like Real People
Our own life experiences can help us write these types of characters. In the real world, we feel what we feel and respond accordingly—but our behavior isn’t random, it stems from somewhere. What we do, say, and believe lines up with who we are and what shaped us.
And that’s the key…to feel real, characters need to think and act in ways that reflect their past experiences, core needs, and the defense systems they’ve built to feel safe. Their choices should follow a psychological and emotional logic that’s unique to them, just as ours is to us.
Writing characters with this sort of depth can feel intimidating—especially as most of us are still figuring ourselves out—but starting with personality can give you a big head start.
Personality Is the Filter for Everything Your Character Says and Does
To write characters whose behavior makes sense, we need to understand their personality. Traits—both positive and negative—determine the way they communicate, how they navigate relationships, and their approach to obstacles and goals. No two characters will handle a situation the same way because their individual personality steers their actions and choices.
Let’s say your character wants their brother-in-law to help them get accepted into a prestigious guild. If they’re friendly and confident, they might ask directly—no pressure, just a belief that their brother-in-law will see their potential and offer support. But if they’re insecure, likely they’d hesitate in being so bold. More likely they’d instead ask about the application process, standing out as a candidate, and whether it helps to have a sponsor, hoping that an offer to vouch for them will come without having to request it. And if your character is manipulative, they may demand an endorsement in exchange for continued silence regarding a closely guarded secret. Nothing like emotional blackmail to grease the wheel.
In each case, the goal is the same, but personality dictates how the character tries to secure it. Behaving in a way that is consistent with who your character is will make their handling of situations feel authentic.
Traits Are the Result of What Your Character Has Lived Through
With so many possible positive traits and negative traits to choose from, it can be hard to narrow down which ones fit a character. Are they observant and practical, or strategic and spontaneous? And what about flaws—are they controlling, impulsive, or have a tendency toward violence?
Just as behavior isn’t random, a person’s defining traits aren’t either. If your character is confident and independent, it’s likely because someone important believed in them—positive influences who encouraged their growth. If they’re dishonest and opportunistic, there’s a reason for that too. Perhaps their mentors had different values and lessons to pass on, or life dealt them an emotional wound that left them mistrustful and biased.
Your character’s personality reveals their identity, what they’ve been through, the lessons they’ve learned, and fears they carry. It’s also not fixed. They will develop new traits as they go, because attributes and flaws aren’t quirks…they’re survival tools.
If someone grew up in a chaotic environment, they may prioritize safety and stability needs. Traits that can help them might be ORGANIZED, RESOURCFUL, INDUSTRIOUS, and CAUTIOUS. These traits help them build a life that is consistent and safe. But then one day, a friend betrays them. The pain of this causes them to examine themselves and how their cautious nature wasn’t enough to protect them. Moving forward, they become SUSPICIOUS and MISTRUSTFUL, as these negative traits help them keep people at a distance, so a betrayal doesn’t happen again.
To zero in on what traits are the best fit for a character, ask:
How did they grow up?
Think about what kind of environment they grew up in. Who were their role models—good or bad? Did they experience unconditional love, neglect, or something in between? Did they have enough, or go without? How did relationships and experiences shape their view of themselves? Consider how events in their past (including emotional wounds) affected their self-esteem, caused fears to form, and shaped their moral code.
What do they yearn for?
Life is never perfect, for us or our characters. Look to what might be missing from their life—acceptance, freedom, recognition, safety? Once you know their core need, you can plan traits that will help them pursue a goal that fills this exact need.
What are their blind spots?
Every character will have flaws that hurt their chances of achieving their goal. These are called blind spots—dysfunctional behavior and attitudes they don’t see as negative, but rather emotional shielding that keeps them safe.
A character who once let their loved ones down may become IRRESPONSIBLE, avoiding anything that could lead to them failing others again.
A character whose kindness was exploited may become UNFRIENDLY and ABRASIVE, pushing others away to avoid being used.
A character who was mocked after opening up may become WITHDRAWN and UNCOMMUNICATIVE, fearing ridicule.
Will the character succeed or fail?
Knowing how things will shake out guides you on how to handle a character’s blind spots. If you intend a character to fail, then throughout the story they may become aware of their flaws and try to leave them behind, but fear keeps them from fully doing so. They’ll fall into old, dysfunctional habits, and ultimately that prevents them from achieving their goal.
But if you want the character to win, they must see how their primary flaw is the problem and the only route forward it to let go of what’s holding them back—not just the flaw, but the fear behind it. To change, your character leans into healthy traits and behaviors so they approach the goal from a position of strength, not weakness.
When you know a character’s personality and why it’s there, you’ll have what you need to write their behavior authentically. Readers sense this consistency and relax into the story, trusting the character’s viewpoint, feelings, and experiences, even when different from their own. But when a character’s actions contradict their personality or past, or certain traits feel pasted on—it creates distance. Readers may not be able to put their finger on what’s wrong, but they’ll feel it.
Do you find it easy or hard to write your character’s behavior consistently? Why do you think that is?
About Angela
Angela Ackerman is a story coach, international speaker, and co-author of the bestselling book, The Emotion Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to Character Expression, and its many sequels. Available in nine languages, her guides are sourced by US universities, recommended by agents and editors, and are used by novelists, screenwriters, and psychologists around the world. To date, this book collection has sold over a million copies.
