Wack Response from Cream City Review
11 Months after I submitted a lyrical essay, I received this slightly irritating response from the
Cream City Review:
Hello Jackson,
I am emailing you as one of the non-fiction editors at the Cream City Review. Sorry that it has taken us so long to reply. Your essay was in our top tier, so we needed some extra time to deliberate over it.
Unfortunately, we found that there were other essays that were more prominent and better suited to our current needs.
Please feel free to continue to submit,
Sarah Joy Freese
Creative Non-Fiction Editor
Cream City Review
So let's review: we took almost a year to get back to you because your essay was really good, but not so good that we wanted to publish it. So sorry. And the clincher is, it didn't even say we thought it was well-written, or please send us more material. No. It said: feel free to keep sending us stuff, which is sort of like saying, you can keep sending us your writing if you want but. . . Look, it's a simple rule, if you make me wait almost a year for a response, I think the response better be kinda of good, otherwise, it doesn't make sense why you'd hold on to it for so long except administrative incompetence or insufficient staff--neither of which makes your journal look great. I don't have any problem with you rejecting my essay within 4-7 months or so. Hell, you could use a form letter and I wouldn't even be that upset. But to send me this lame email almost a year after I sent it to you is just uncool. It's the most impersonal personal response I've read in years. And fuck, The Paris Review is better at rejecting people at a merciful speed. Anyway, I'm looking forward to reading all the essays in this journal that are so much more prominent and better suited to your editorial needs. And you know what, they better be fucking amazing. I better shit on myself after each essay, or I'm going to send your journal photocopies of the NYC phonebook every two months as a story submission just so you have to waste your time.
Hello Jackson,
I am emailing you as one of the non-fiction editors at the Cream City Review. Sorry that it has taken us so long to reply. Your essay was in our top tier, so we needed some extra time to deliberate over it.
Unfortunately, we found that there were other essays that were more prominent and better suited to our current needs.
Please feel free to continue to submit,
Sarah Joy Freese
Creative Non-Fiction Editor
Cream City Review
So let's review: we took almost a year to get back to you because your essay was really good, but not so good that we wanted to publish it. So sorry. And the clincher is, it didn't even say we thought it was well-written, or please send us more material. No. It said: feel free to keep sending us stuff, which is sort of like saying, you can keep sending us your writing if you want but. . . Look, it's a simple rule, if you make me wait almost a year for a response, I think the response better be kinda of good, otherwise, it doesn't make sense why you'd hold on to it for so long except administrative incompetence or insufficient staff--neither of which makes your journal look great. I don't have any problem with you rejecting my essay within 4-7 months or so. Hell, you could use a form letter and I wouldn't even be that upset. But to send me this lame email almost a year after I sent it to you is just uncool. It's the most impersonal personal response I've read in years. And fuck, The Paris Review is better at rejecting people at a merciful speed. Anyway, I'm looking forward to reading all the essays in this journal that are so much more prominent and better suited to your editorial needs. And you know what, they better be fucking amazing. I better shit on myself after each essay, or I'm going to send your journal photocopies of the NYC phonebook every two months as a story submission just so you have to waste your time.