Travels with Sizzle

"We have read your manuscript with boundless delight"

—It’s discouraging, Sizzle!

I’m sorry, Debby. But you have to keep going—you and your hat

—Here’s a rejection letter for all time. Millie sent it, after seeing it in James Clear’s newsletter:

“Writer and translator Estelle Gilson shares this translation of a rejection slip issued by a Chinese economic journal and, in the process, reveals the most incredible way to say no: 

”We have read your manuscript with boundless delight. If we were to publish your paper, it would be impossible for us to publish any work of lower standard. And as it is unthinkable that in the next thousand years we shall see its equal, we are, to our regret, compelled to return your divine composition and to beg you a thousand times to overlook our short sight and timidity.”

—The original source, Sizzle, is Sweet Theft, which I will receive in my next truckload of books.

—Here’s another good quote, this one from the writers conference aboard the Queen Mary 2: “Embrace mediocrity, for things that are less important.”

That’s hard for you to do, Deb

—It is. But it could be a new goal. Like learning to back the car into the carport.

Which you always try to do perfectly

—A goal, Sizzle, a goal . . .

Wooof-woof via Unsplash