Twilight Was Rejected Fourteen Times Before Being Accepted
Today I found out Twilight was rejected by fourteen publishers before finally getting published. In other news, fourteen out of fifteen publishing houses have quality standards on works they accept. Though of course, in this case at least, having no literary standards seems to have paid off for lucky number fifteen. So good on ya to them.
Boggles the mind that a poorly written story about a young girl who’s trying to choose between necrophilia and bestiality could do so well; especially considering one of the main characters is a 108 year old pedophile who spends his years hanging out around high school aged girls.
But apparently over 17 million young girls and a disturbing number of grown women, seem not to care. Stay classy ladies. Stay classy.
Sources:
While I hate Twilight with a passion, any never before published author will get rejected tons of times. 14 is actually not that many.
It hurts me to defend such a terrible book but… it’s the truth.
@Joseph: Absolutely true. John Grisham’s “A Time to Kill”, his first novel, was rejected according to him by “30 or so publishers and another 30 or so editors” before finally being picked up. Sadly, a pretty common tail for even great literature.
The problem stems from the fact that publishers are forced to be extremely selective on what they accept due to very low profit margins. This all comes from, during the Great Depression, books being such a low seller that stores stopped stocking them. To compensate, publishers decided to allow book stores to send back any unsold book inventory if they’d just stock the books in the first place and it has been this way every since.
Because of this, a book is never actually sold until the end customer buys it and if a publisher miscalculates how many of a given book it chooses to have made will sell, they may end up with literally thousands of copies of a book which are unsellable, which really tends to cut down on profits and makes a lot of books published end up being published for a loss.
So it all comes down to that publishers must be extremely selective about what they publish and must always keep profit in mind on what they publish. They can’t afford to think too much about how good the book is from a literary stand point, which is sad.
Stephen King had been rejected so many times that he was going to give up writing. Fortunately his wife pulled “Carrie” out of the trash (where Stephen had tossed it) and sent it to one more publisher who ended up taking it.
Have you read the book(s)? There are way too many people negatively commenting on the books who have never actually tried reading them. The movies were horrible, yes but the books aren’t. I’ve read them, unlike many other critics. I went into it experimentally, thinking I wouldn’t like it but I actually really enjoyed the series. Who’s to say what someone should like or shouldn’t like though? If so many people enjoy these books, the author has succeeded in creating a great story and should be applauded. Calling thousands upon thousands of people, many of whom are avid and even picky readers tasteless is just silly and makes you look like an idiot. There’s something there that is great in these books. If they don’t appeal to you then so be it, but that doesn’t mean everyone they do appeal to has bad taste or is insane.
In all fairness, Harry Potter was originally rejected from around 12 publishing houses before one finally decided to publish it.
My brother is trying to get his novels published (I think his genre is sci-fi/fantasy). I think he’s been rejected 42 times already. But I just got news that he has an agent who wants some sample chapters…so hopefully this one will back him up ^_^
By the way, before you can send your stuff to a publishing company, you should get an agent to represent you first, which is the stage my brother’s at right now. I mean, no publishing company is going to read some stuff by a no-body. If they are sent manuscripts from agents who consistently have a good eye for literature and you are represented by one of those agents, then it’ll make things a whole lot easier.
Novelists experience a LOT of rejection…from agents, from editors, and from publishers. Yikes. And my brother said only 0.1% of all manuscripts submitted to publishers get picked up. Double yikes. Sometimes I really applaud my bro for still trying after all these rejection letters.
As for Twilight, the writing is elementary and sappy at (a lot of the) times, but for some people, that makes it a quick and easy read, which is what they’re looking for. The thing I don’t like is the underlying message that Meyer conveys to girls with her Bella/Edward relationship; trying to pass them off as “the perfect couple” but when you look past all her physical descriptions of Edward’s “perfection”, it’s just an emotionally abusive relationship that’s unhealthy. Yes, I can say this because I’ve read the books and I’m not a fan.
So wait I’m confused… its your problem with the stories that they are poorly written OR is it that you don’t like the subject matter?
Because you said they are poorly written (I had just assumed, without reading them, that they would be) but then go on to simply talk about how outrageous you find the subject matter – “bestiality or necrophilia” etc.
Subject matter doesn’t matter bad writing. It’s the actual quality of the prose that makes good or bad writing.
So your paragraphs about the subject matter sort of seemed out of place unless it was just for a cheep laugh….. ?
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Just wanted to comment on the “story about a young girl who’s trying to choose between necrophilia and bestiality” remark. I’ve heard this once before, and its pretty funny as a joke, however that is clearly not what the story is really about. She doesn’t have an asphyxiation with doing animals and fucking dead people. Jacob Black is a human, and over time gets the ability to transform into a wolf, and unless she hooks up with him in wolf form it isn’t bestiality; and Edward Cullen isn’t a lifeless body awaiting it’s trip to the grave. Although he may be consider dead-alive, he has free will, a personality, and can talk and walk and learn, so it’s not something a necrophiliac would consider. Also, the fact that you stated that “the main characters is a 108 year old” your implying that he has lived for 108 years, making your statement about liking him makes you a necro false. I have never read the books or felt compelled to, however I have seen the movies, and although many parts of it were laughable, acting and story wise, overall it is enjoyable and combined with the eye candy, it makes sense that so many ladies enjoy it; movies and books, do not need to be masterpieces to be enjoyed.
First off, let us first learn the proper definition of asphyxiation before using it. And yes, getting published is hard. But no, getting an agent isn’t the only way to do it.
But in all literary fairness, the Twilight series is mediocre, over adjectified fiction which, sadly, is what many thrive upon because it is not difficult to read.
Arguments for the literary merit of Twilight all too often circle around sales which, by no means, are not a cause for the thought of merit. It simply means it sold well.
correction *a fixation
Also Colin I was trying to point out how poorly this article was written, although it had intriguing ideas, it didn’t have anything to back up anything it said and had easily arguable points. That along with the idea that the writer thought being rejected 14 times was terrible, when in reality almost all authors go through the same thing made him sound rather naive; ruining his intellectual merit on the subject.
i’ve read twilight and i liked it when i was in high school.
a few years later i saw the movie and reread the books.
total crap.
the series is basically a chaste version of the trashy romance novels that lonely housewives and lonelier old maids read to get their proverbial rocks off. not to mention the writing itself is comparative to a terrible fanfiction written by a high school girl. Just look at the fans:
1. teenage girls
2. teenage boys who want to be teenage girls
3. older women who wish they had more romance in their lives
terrible.
Yeah I hate to join the defense, but being rejected only 14 times is almost impressive. It’s extremely difficult to get an agent.
I’m not a teenage girl, a teenage boy or an “older” woman. In fact I’m in my early 20′s, just married and have plenty of “romance” in my life. I am well read, I’m an English Major at University, and I write myself. I’ve read the books, I enjoy the books and I have only a few criticisms about the literary merits of the writing. It is an enjoyable easy read.
I have noticed however that the majority of anti-Twilight comments (on here and in life) are from the male populace, whether they’ve read the books or seen the movies, or not. I haven’t quite worked out what their particular problem with it is yet, I am working on this enigma though. Observations so far indicate a dislike of not knowing what appeals to the girls they can’t have or even do have, and an association of the “sparkly vampires” with homosexual connotations. I’m sure these aren’t the only reasons though, like I said, I’m working on it
I agree with “Reader” above – I hated the films, but didn’t want to criticise without reading the books properly. I picked up the first one, fully expecting to hate it – and finished the series inside 10 days.
It’s not perfect, Bella royally pisses me off with her reliance on men to make her happy, the deliberate “isn’t she intelligent” in the writing and a few other traits; and there are writing flaws aplenty. However, name me an author who doesn’t mess up? Try reading the first release of The Gunslinger, it’s just as bad. The story, however, is somehow compelling and the writing can hold the attention well.
I’m not a teenage girl (in fact, I fall in neither category), but I still manage to accidentally relate the character and enjoy the story. Give it a go, forget the myriad abuse of punctuation in the first book and just let yourself read it: you might be as suprised as I was.
The only reason this got published is because the publisher knew they would make shit loads of money of stupid teenage girls and older girls who are unhappy with themselves. That’s it. A turd would get published if the publisher thought it would make him money.
I read the first book but not the rest because simply put, it was boring. I shouldn’t have even given it more than 50-100 pages, but I was determined to have some basis to discuss it. Bella’s constant monologuing and the snails pace of the plot drove me crazy. Throw in poor prose and childish characters and it makes for a pretty crappy book. I suppose there are many people who like the middle-school style drama, with “him liking her but oh but oh wait he doesn’t but she thinks he’s hot, or does she, yes she does but they can’t oh they can!”, I found it a yawn worthy of the toilet roll.
I’m not a fan of Twilight, but how many times a book gets rejected has often little to do with its quality and more to do with whether or not the publishing house thinks that it will make money. Regarding that decision I’m sure that Twilight’s publishers are laughing their way to the bank at nonsense like this.
Also: pedophilia is the attraction to children; ephebophilia is attraction to adolescents. I would expect such knowledgeable critic of literature and the English language as Davin here to realize the difference.
I do indeed know the difference (and actually have written an article on it; though it’s been sitting in the completed “drafts” for about three months now due to wondering if the title would scare people off)
. However, as I know the vast majority of the English speaking world seem not to know the difference between the two or rather, not know the latter word at all, I chose the more common misused word “pedophile”; thus, opting for understandability, rather than literal correctness.
@Reader:
I have read all of the books and seen all of the (released) movies and I still think they are horrible as everyone says (if not more so.) I also disagree with you in that sitting through the movies is much better than reading the books. I read them the first time because I had heard so many people talking about them, so for the most part completely neutral. While I can understand why they are appealing for some people to read, I still think that for an educated person reading them is huge waste of time.
For the “middle school aged girl” category, it is not a terrible thing for them to read if it gets young adults who don’t typically enjoy reading to read (despite all the negative aspects of the story; however, ask yourself at 11-14 did you really know what all those things were?) However, that is about as far as I can go to praise the books. For such a wide-open, and almost interesting, story line (girl falls in love with a boy(s) she can’t and shouldn’t be with then gets into trouble with the said boy(s)), Meyer completely destroys it with her poor writing style and prose along with many things that other people have mentioned. While the story line is a bit compelling, following it through the dragged-down prose is rather difficult and frustrating. I consider it at about the same level as “trashy romance novels” except cleaned up content wise to be made appropriate for younger readers. If that is the type of books you enjoy reading, then so be it; however, for more avid and refined readers, the books probably are highly unappealing, thus the large amounts of negative criticism.
And for the record, I fall into the “teenage girl” category.
Don’t you mean fourteen agents? Publishers don’t accept unsolicited manuscripts.
Nobody lives on truffles, caviar and champagne. Sometimes you want mac n’cheese. I found the books to be a nice, easy, rainy afternoon read. Did they change my life? No. Did I enjoy them? Yes. I find that the people who sneer at the Twilight books tend to be those who hold their own intellect in high esteem, possibly without enough reinforcement from others. I know plenty of people who have said that the books just were not their cup of tea without feeling the need to denigrate those who did enjoy them. I guess I will just have to assume that those people are more intellectually secure than others.
This makes a lot of sense, though I sort of wish she had given up after fourteen rejections so we wouldn’t be tortured by the belligerently ridiculous hell that is the Twilight fandom.
@Irene
Well yes, but there’s a difference between “enjoying” something and an obsession. I don’t mind Twilight fans, but I can’t stand those who are all “omgjacob/edwardzgonnamarrysme~” And I know not all of them are like that, but from my observations a lot are, and that is really scary.
@Spooge
I agree. D:
I, personally, had about enough of the whole series from the minute I got five pages into Breaking Dawn. Or when Kristen Stewart was cast, whichever came first. So I’m absolutely sick of everything about it. I don’t know what possessed Meyer to write such utter bullshit. Especially when there are better writers out there who deserve to be published, but then they aren’t.
Honestly.. who cares if people like the books/ movies.. if you don’t like it, get over it.
This may come as a shock but not everyone likes the same thing. I could care less if you didn’t like Twilight, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy or Great Expectations. People like whatever they like and having some embittered trolls whine about how much they don’t like a book because a,b and c isn’t going to stop them from enjoying it.
The only people I have ever talked to that didn’t like the books have never read them. Plus, I find it appalling that so few men read them. It’s not just a mushy love story, it’s got a lot of action in it as well. Please, read the books before you criticize. They aren’t pieces of classic American literature, but the storyline is creative and unique.