My first story submission was rejected!

[cunning_1]

I submitted my first story about 5 days ago and today it was rejected. Unfortunately no reason or feedback was provided. Is this common? I am happy to go back and try to fix any problems but without feedback that is difficult. I am reaching out to a volunteer editor hoping that may help. Any other suggestions? Thanks!

 

[RelentlessOnanism]

I'm surprised you didn’t get any feedback as to why it was rejected. A couple of times I've had stories sent back, usually because I've pushed at the boundaries of underage activity. But they did tell me why they had been rejected.

 

[KeithD]

The understanding here is that a rejection always comes with a reason, in the form of a question--making an assumption (not always correct) of what is in the story that is causing it to be rejected. What is the full wording of the rejection notice you received?

 

[cunning_1]

The understanding here is that a rejection always comes with a reason, in the form of a question--making an assumption (not always correct) of what is in the story that is causing it to be rejected. What is the full wording of the rejection notice you received?

Here is the message I received:

Dear Writer,

Thank you for your submission to Literotica. We appreciate the time and effort you've taken to write a story and submit it to our site . However, we've found that we cannot post your submission in its current form. The checklist below may help you in re-examining your manuscript.

Mary and Me By Cunning_1 MF, MMF, Wife Swap, Reluctant, DP, M+F, Incest? <em>Author’s Note: This is my first attempt at an erotic story for publication. Feedback is welcome but please be kind!</em>....

From there the entire story was embedded as text with no comments. After the story there was the following text:

Please feel free to re-submit the story after a Volunteer Editor has examined it, or after you've made revisions. You can find a list of Volunteer Editors here.

Please consult our Writer's Resources section and make sure you read our submission guidelines:

If you have any questions on these, please let us know.

Thanks for your time, and look forward to reading you again!

Laurel & Manu
Literotica.Com

I must admit to being pretty baffled. Any ideas or suggestions are welcome. This is my first story so I really want to do things correctly!

 

[Blind_Justice]

-snip-

I must admit to being pretty baffled. Any ideas or suggestions are welcome. This is my first story so I really want to do things correctly!

The <em></em> tags suggest you're using HTML formatting beyond what is allowed on the site. I think the most you're allowed to use are underline, bold, italics and (maybe) center tags. Also, -and I'm not aure on that one- your tags should go into the tag fields you can fill out during the submission process and not into the author's notes.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Here is the message I received:

Dear Writer,

Thank you for your submission to Literotica. We appreciate the time and effort you've taken to write a story and submit it to our site . However, we've found that we cannot post your submission in its current form. The checklist below may help you in re-examining your manuscript.

Mary and Me By Cunning_1 MF, MMF, Wife Swap, Reluctant, DP, M+F, Incest? <em>Author’s Note: This is my first attempt at an erotic story for publication. Feedback is welcome but please be kind!</em>....

From there the entire story was embedded as text with no comments.

Usually, instead of a copy of your story text, you would get some standard text about the reason for rejection. Possibly Laurel and/or an automated system pasted the wrong content, instead of the standard "check these reasons for rejection" message.

I'd recommend sending a private message to Laurel, letting her know about this issue.

Some of the common reasons for rejection:

- spelling/grammar
- under-age sex. Sometimes a story will accidentally get flagged for this even when there isn't any, e.g. it mentions a 16-year-old in a non-sexual context. If that happens, you can just resubmit and use the Notes field to clarify, but be aware that the ban includes fantasies or masturbation involving under-18s.
- nonconsent where the victim doesn't get off
- nonconsent in the celeb/fanfic category

 

[TarnishedPenny]

You can always send a PM to Laurel, asking for more guidance.

 

[ElectricBlue]

The <em></em> tags suggest you're using HTML formatting beyond what is allowed on the site. I think the most you're allowed to use are underline, bold, italics and (maybe) center tags. Also, -and I'm not aure on that one- your tags should go into the tag fields you can fill out during the submission process and not into the author's notes.

It's worth a try, as BlindJustice suggests, to strip html out of the text, remove the question mark from "incest?" - if that's your tag - and resubmit. You've upset the html bot, possibly. That might be quicker than sending a PM - and if it's still glitching, you've got another chance of getting the right reject notice.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I submitted my first story about 5 days ago and today it was rejected. Unfortunately no reason or feedback was provided. Is this common? I am happy to go back and try to fix any problems but without feedback that is difficult. I am reaching out to a volunteer editor hoping that may help. Any other suggestions? Thanks!

My first submission was rejected too, because of formatting errors. Take the time to learn how to do it right, and try again. You should do fine. Good luck!

 

[GroverLang]

The <em></em> tags suggest you're using HTML formatting beyond what is allowed on the site. I think the most you're allowed to use are underline, bold, italics and (maybe) center tags. Also, -and I'm not aure on that one- your tags should go into the tag fields you can fill out during the submission process and not into the author's notes.

When I began I was submitting in Word and then I was told .rtf was better because Laurel had to convert Word to .rtf for publishing. Recently I decided to try Word again and the conclusion I’ve come to is it doesn’t make any difference. I write with iPages using my phone which is handy because it’s instantly duplicated on my pc. When I’ve finished and it’s ready to submit I download a Word copy to the relevant folder which takes ten seconds.

I don’t paste a story I upload it. Presumably everyone keeps their stories in a folder?

 

[KeithD]

I've cut and pasted all of my stories directly in the text block from Word. Some 1,300 of them.

 

[RelentlessOnanism]

When I began I was submitting in Word and then I was told .rtf was better because Laurel had to convert Word to .rtf for publishing. Recently I decided to try Word again and the conclusion I’ve come to is it doesn’t make any difference. I write with iPages using my phone which is handy because it’s instantly duplicated on my pc. When I’ve finished and it’s ready to submit I download a Word copy to the relevant folder which takes ten seconds.

I don’t paste a story I upload it. Presumably everyone keeps their stories in a folder?

I write everything on Pages on my iPad, which is just about the least compatible format on Earth. I used to be able to use Word for iPad, but they now charge for that if your screen size is too big and, purely coincidentally of course, the latest iPad is too big by about 0.1 of an inch.

I use quite a bit of formatting, so I have to copy and paste my story, email it to my work laptop (which has Word) and upload it from there. Then I have to quickly clear the text from the laptop, just so the IT department doesn’t find anything too dodgy.

 

[Rustyoznail]

I use Google Docs. I can work on it anywhere and on anything, it doesn't raise any flags with IT, and I download the file in Word Docx format and submit it. Never had a problem.

 

[RejectReality]

Looks to me like Laurel may have forgotten to tick the "reason for" box before hitting the submit button.

It could possibly be the <em> tag. The standard on Lit is to use <i> instead. I've never tried with <em> so I don't know if that's a rejection reason.

Is that set apart from the text of the original submission with a bullet point next to it? If so, that's certainly it. Replace the em tag with i, and make sure you don't have any other html formatting in there beyond the few tags mentioned earlier.

Otherwise, so far as non-content rejections go, scrutinize your punctuation related to dialogue. That's the most common reason submissions get rejected when they don't break content rules.

 

[cunning_1]

Thanks for all of the suggestions. I wrote the story in Word and used Word to convert to an rtf which is how I submitted the story. Maybe I should just attach the Word doc and resubmit? I sent it off to a volunteer editor and will wait to see any comments that come back before resubmitting. It couldn't hurt!

 

[GroverLang]

I write everything on Pages on my iPad, which is just about the least compatible format on Earth. I used to be able to use Word for iPad, but they now charge for that if your screen size is too big and, purely coincidentally of course, the latest iPad is too big by about 0.1 of an inch.

I use quite a bit of formatting, so I have to copy and paste my story, email it to my work laptop (which has Word) and upload it from there. Then I have to quickly clear the text from the laptop, just so the IT department doesn’t find anything too dodgy.

Do you just have an iPad and no computer at home? Even if the only computer you have is at work you can sync Pages on both devices and then, as I’ve already said, it only takes a matter of seconds to download a Word version. It’s a lot easier than sending emails. As long as you don’t give anyone your Pages password you’re okay because there’s nothing on your computer, it’s all in the Cloud.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Thanks for all of the suggestions. I wrote the story in Word and used Word to convert to an rtf which is how I submitted the story. Maybe I should just attach the Word doc and resubmit? I sent it off to a volunteer editor and will wait to see any comments that come back before resubmitting. It couldn't hurt!

.rtf works okay, I often submit in that format. My guess it's the html getting in the way. Does your story really need anything other than plain text?

The other thing you could try is to cut and paste the whole thing into the text box to see what it looks like on preview. That should show if formatting has gone wrong.

 

[jaF0]

Looks to me like Laurel may have forgotten to tick the "reason for" box before hitting the submit button.

Or pasted the wrong bits. I've only had a couple sent back, but they never included the whole text of the story.

 

[jaF0]

I sent it off to a volunteer editor and will wait to see any comments that come back before resubmitting. It couldn't hurt!

Post a paragraph or two, no more in this thread and let us have a go at it.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I write in Pages on my MacBook and just copy/paste my stories to the site. I've had no problems after my initial confusion. I'm not much of a techie, but it seems to me like a lot of people go through more work than need be.

 

[Jada59]

I've cut and pasted all of my stories directly in the text block from Word. Some 1,300 of them.

I do that too.

 

[oggbashan]

I do that too.

So do I. I add tags for italics and bold in the copied draft.

 

[vanmyers86]

I just upload my Word doc as an attachment. Always works. But I am a simple kinda gal.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I just upload my Word doc as an attachment. Always works. But I am a simple kinda gal.

Same here.
I've even included some italics and bolding in the word doc, and it's come out right when published.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

I've cut and pasted all of my stories directly in the text block from Word.

Works for me, too.