Rejected: Monkey Punch Dinosaur

I got a lovely rejection email from Murdoch Books last week re: my proposal for an art-book collection of illustrations of monkeys punching dinosaurs.

I’m not ashamed that I’m trying to jump on the blog-to-book bandwagon – I’d love a piece of that Belle de Jour / Stuff White People Like / Shit My Dad Says pie, and I reckon Monkey Punch Dinosaur: The Book of the Blog has got exactly the high-concept one-joke chops required to rub shoulders with the above. I just need to find the right publisher to take a punt.

I’m always heartened when I get a reasoned-out explanation of why someone is passing on one of my manuscripts. The fact that Diana from Murdoch took the time to reply to my proposal with a five-paragraph email that described her thoughts on why she wasn’t going to take it on, but which still described the proposed book as “rather wonderful”, gave a little lift to my week and my hopes for getting this thing published eventually, not to mention my self-confidence as a writer-slash-creative person.

(Counting the knock-back I got from Allen & Unwin last year, that’s two no-thankses so far for MPD: TBOTB. Which is nothing to get all choked up about, really. (Two rejections? Hah! I’ll take two and run a mile!))

I mean, sure, they don’t want it, but she didn’t say that the idea was terrible. At the very least the idea merited a human response and not a form letter. That’s more than reason enough to keep on trying to get this thing published.