Rejected for realistic chat dialog

[cottonnightie]

I have been publishing my novel The Other Half serially since I finished it. The next two chapters in my story (ch. 6 and 7) were rejected this morning for improper capitalization and punctuation.

I've worked for weeks rewriting with two different Literotica editors and a host of beta readers over on Reddit. I assume the issue is a conversation occurring between two people via Internet chat. The non-standard capitalization and punctuation were purposeful to realistically portray the styles of writing and abbreviation used by two different people.

I am already frustrated by the length of time it takes to get stories up here, so I have been submitting a chapter or two every other day to space out their appearance. Now the chapters will likely appear out-of-order because of this.

I've resubmitted the stories with a note about the non-standard spelling and punctuation, but I'm seriously considering just pulling them all at this point. Sorry for the attitude, but I'm so disappointed.

CN

 

[Darkniciad]

It happens. Laurel is approving 70+ stories per day, so she has to skim.

Whenever you include something that might be mistaken as bad grammar or breaking a rule if not examined for context, you should utilize the "notes" section of the submission to point it out. That dramatically reduces the chances that she'll see something in quick-scroll and quick-reject it.

My LST3K series takes horrible stories and makes fun of them ( with the author's permission ) so I make sure to put a note on there that the horrible grammar and spelling are there on purpose, to be mocked. They go through without a hitch. I've done the same when I thought something might be mistaken for underage, or some other rule-breaker.

Sending Laurel a PM about the issue of chapters possibly appearing out of sequence would probably be a good idea. You can find her by checking the "awards and contests" forum, where she is the only thread starter for most threads. From there, just find the PM option in her profile.

Alternately, since the resubmits are already in the queue, you could open each of the pending chapters that follow, and click the "save changes" button. That will move the later chapters to the back of the queue, behind the chapters you resubmitted.

If you resubmitted the two rejected chapters at the same time, there's a good chance they'll go up on subsequent days. That's the standard practice for chapters submitted at the same time. The same will apply with the method I suggested above, so if you want to put that three day gap in there between chapters, you'll probably have to account for that.

However, since there's going to be a delay anyway, the readers will probably appreciate a quicker burst of chapters to make up for it, and when multiple chapters are set up this way, any but the first are often "pre-approved" showing a date of publication in the future, with the "pending" link grayed out. Those stories go up at exactly midnight on the date listed, and thus have a longer exposure than you sometimes get.

EDIT: It's been forever since I've had to mess with a queued story. The button may be "submit" Whichever one completes the submission again and takes you back to your submission list.

 

[cottonnightie]

Thanks for the good advice. I will probably do as you suggested and delay all the stories now.

I've been getting email from impatient readers (which is a great thing), but I've been telling them all that the next chapters are queued up and are just waiting approval at this point. Resetting the queue will push them all out another week, which is the heart of the frustration I feel.

I do appreciate how hard it is to examine so many submissions. I'll find something more constructive to do with my frustration.

 

[sr71plt]

-- nevermind --

I hadn't caught the first time around that this was Internet chat (written) and not dialogue (spoken).

 

[Darkniciad]

You'd probably be hard pressed to find anyone with more than a handful of stories who hasn't run afoul of at least one mistaken rejection.

I just balance all the little pitfalls and WTF moments with the number of eyes Lit puts on my stories -- easily twice that of any other erotic story site according to Alexa stats.

Glad to have been of help

Thanks for the good advice. I will probably do as you suggested and delay all the stories now.

I've been getting email from impatient readers (which is a great thing), but I've been telling them all that the next chapters are queued up and are just waiting approval at this point. Resetting the queue will push them all out another week, which is the heart of the frustration I feel.

I do appreciate how hard it is to examine so many submissions. I'll find something more constructive to do with my frustration.

 

[cottonnightie]

You'd probably be hard pressed to find anyone with more than a handful of stories who hasn't run afoul of at least one mistaken rejection.

I sent a PM to Laurel yesterday, double-checked the text of my story just to make sure I didn't miss anything else... and Chapter 6 was rejected again this morning... along with 7, 8 and 9 with a note that they are fine, but I should resubmit after 6 is posted.

I can't see where to delete my stories and account. Is it in the profile page? Do I need to send another message to someone?

CN

 

[DeYaKen]

Taking stories down.

I sent a PM to Laurel yesterday, double-checked the text of my story just to make sure I didn't miss anything else... and Chapter 6 was rejected again this morning... along with 7, 8 and 9 with a note that they are fine, but I should resubmit after 6 is posted.

I can't see where to delete my stories and account. Is it in the profile page? Do I need to send another message to someone?

CN

I think you have to ask Laurel to take them down for you. You certainly explain why there are so many serials on lit that never get finished.

Try not to let it get you down, there are plenty of other sites that of other sites that will take your stories.

I will continue to use lit, as long as they'll let me. I feel a certain loyalty, they posted my first story. I also have a small following and I feel I owe it to them to continue. I have a number of people who love to hate my stories and I owe it to them to give them another reason to get hot under the collar.

Best of luck, whatever you decide to do.

 

[cottonnightie]

I think you have to ask Laurel to take them down for you. You certainly explain why there are so many serials on lit that never get finished.

Try not to let it get you down, there are plenty of other sites that of other sites that will take your stories.

I will continue to use lit, as long as they'll let me. I feel a certain loyalty, they posted my first story. I also have a small following and I feel I owe it to them to continue. I have a number of people who love to hate my stories and I owe it to them to give them another reason to get hot under the collar.

Best of luck, whatever you decide to do.

Thanks for the kind response.

It's a shame, because I really love this place. In the last five months I've made some good friends and gotten some terrific feedback from readers and editors. I just can't take the aggravation with the submission process anymore. Writing is my fun time hobby and this one aspect of it is making it extremely un-fun for me. The delay and anxiety waiting to see if something will make it out of the submission queue is causing me too much heartburn.

As a point of contrast, in just the time I've spent getting this one chapter published here, I've been able to figure out how to make my story into a proper ebook format, discovered how to buy images from a stock photo site to make a cover, and gotten my book listed on Smashwords and Amazon. Just this morning I got my first review on Smashwords from a reader who claims I'm responsible for them being tired because they couldn't put the book down last night.

Oh well....

CN

 

[sr71plt]

The stories in question were just rejected once and you didn't include any discussion on the special wordage use in the notes box the first time and haven't just refilled with that explanation in the notes box this time?

I've had stories rejected--all but one of them passed through without changes after giving an explanation in the notes box of the refile. The one that wasn't had included fake URLs, but there's a rule about using any URLs at all. I didn't understand that to include face URLs. I adjusted and the story got published.

You used the nonstandard technique, didn't you? You could put a little effort into coordinating use of it with the editor, I would think.

 

[cottonnightie]

The stories in question were just rejected once and you didn't include any discussion on the special wordage use in the notes box the first time and haven't just refilled with that explanation in the notes box this time?

I've had stories rejected--all but one of them passed through without changes after giving an explanation in the notes box of the refile. The one that wasn't had included fake URLs, but there's a rule about using any URLs at all. I didn't understand that to include face URLs. I adjusted and the story got published.

You used the nonstandard technique, didn't you? You could put a little effort into coordinating use of it with the editor, I would think.

Twice, not once. I included a comment about the Internet chat dialog in the notes for the submission and sent a PM to Laurel yesterday. It was rejected this morning, but oddly chapter 7 was not this time.

There were no fake urls or any other oddities, just a section of dialog at the end of the chapter where one character typed normally and the other used all lowercase and no punctuation. The dialog was quoted normally. I did it because it made the conversation easier to follow without a bunch of he typed / she typed nonsense.

I've submitted my REMOVE story at this point, so it's done as far as I'm concerned. I'm only hanging out here to make sure the PMs I sent to friends go through.

 

[sr71plt]

Don't know what's happening then. I've had stories pass with lower-cased Internet chat.

And not much we on the forum can do about a possible disconnect without seeing the material and the wording of the rejection notice. Usually when this gets to this point, the rejection wasn't for what the author thought it was.

 

[cottonnightie]

Don't know what's happening then. I've had stories pass with lower-cased Internet chat.

And not much we on the forum can do about a possible disconnect without seeing the material and the wording of the rejection notice. Usually when this gets to this point, the rejection wasn't for what the author thought it was.

Here is what the second rejection said exactly:

"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.

* Did I check to make sure everything was spelled correctly?

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"


+++++


The note I included with the submission said:

"Editors were [redacted] and [redacted].

This story was rejected for improper capitalization and punctuation.

I assume it is reference to the conversation between two people via Internet chat.

The differences in capitalization and punctuation were purposeful to realistically portray the styles of writing and abbreviation used by two different people.

If this is not an acceptable context to relax those particular rules, let me know and I'll remove my account and stories from this site."

 

[sr71plt]

Well, the rejection says "spelling," not "capitalization and punctuation."

These problems most generally are a "ships passing in the night" understand of what the issue is.

 

[cottonnightie]

Well, the rejection says "spelling," not "capitalization and punctuation."

These problems most generally are a "ships passing in the night" understand of what the issue is.

Not that it really matters, but the first rejection said both while this one said just spelling. Regardless, I'm not willing to work this hard every time to make the process work, and there is nothing productive I can do to try to make it better.

 

[sr71plt]

Not that it really matters, but the first rejection said both while this one said just spelling. Regardless, I'm not willing to work this hard every time to make the process work, and there is nothing productive I can do to try to make it better.

Too bad. If you still need to know how to delete the others, refile them with DELETE at the end of the title and with a note saying you want the story deleted in the notes box. And wait at least the same number of days it would take for it to submit (up to a week currently). Hope you find another good site to post it to.