That time a librarian handed me a rejected query letter she found in the trash

I was at the downtown public library in Portland digging through the donation bin for old notebooks. One of the librarians, a quiet lady named Margaret, came over and dropped a crumpled letter on the table. She said "This got thrown out by the author who wrote that thriller you checked out last week. Read the editor's notes, they might help your own stuff." It was a brutal rejection but had really specific feedback about pacing and character motivation. Has anyone else ever stumbled across real writing advice from a rejected manuscript?

2 comments

2 Comments

dianagreen1d ago

Stole a crumpled rejection letter out of a library trash can once in grad school. Had a whole paragraph from a publisher about how my character's motivation fell apart in chapter three. Rewrote that section and it got me an agent a year later. Sometimes the best feedback comes from the places you least expect.

benlewis1d ago

A writer I follow on Substack mentioned something similar last month about how they dug through a slush pile reject bin at a used bookstore and found a note from an editor that basically saved their whole second act. @dianagreen that story about the library trash is wild but also kind of genius. It makes me wonder how many perfect pieces of advice are sitting in dumpsters or stuck inside returned books. That specific chapter three feedback is exactly the kind of stuff you'd never get in a form letter.