You don't need advice from editors on rejected manuscripts
by MrBuddyCasino on 4/22/2026, 8:25:32 AM
<a href="https://xcancel.com/orsonscottcard/status/2046702294406680751" rel="nofollow">https://xcancel.com/orsonscottcard/status/204670229440668075...</a>
https://twitter.com/orsonscottcard/status/2046702294406680751
Comments
by: trjordan
As a pratical lens on this advice: people are excellent at giving feedback on their problems. They are terrible at identifying how to fix it.<p>"It felt too long" was right. The solution was not to make the story shorter. The solution was to look at the parts that felt long, and believe that feedback.<p>If you're building something, and your users tell you it's complicated or it's slow or it's not useful, they're right! The fix may or may not be to make it simpler, faster, or more useful. Maybe it needs to be organized better, or to create deliberate moments of action, or to be used at a different time. The problems are real, but the obvious solutions are not always right.
4/22/2026, 8:15:46 PM
by: mwigdahl
I liked Zvi Mowshowitz' summary of this: If someone tells you what's wrong, listen to them. If they tell you how to fix it, ignore them.
4/22/2026, 7:26:10 PM
by: grvbck
> You don't need advice from editors on rejected manuscripts.<p>Continues to tell us how he did listen to the advice because the editor actually had a point that made the story better, got the book published and won him an award.
4/22/2026, 8:18:36 PM
by: Silamoth
There’s a similar situation in game dev. Players are very good at identifying problems - this isn’t fun, this feels too hard, etc. However, the solutions they suggest are often terrible, resulting in broken, unfun games. The same advice applies: Figure out what’s actually wrong and fix that.<p>Is that level really too hard, or did you just fail to properly introduce a new ability? Is the story boring, or is the story taking away from the enjoyable gameplay?
4/22/2026, 8:52:13 PM
by: fastaguy88
Well, perhaps Orsen Scott Card does not need editors’ advice. But odds are you do.
4/22/2026, 8:04:17 PM
by: raincole
I've found the traditional publishing industry really interesting. It's so hard to get approved or even noticed from the gatekeepers[0]. Even getting a <i>rejection</i> from an agent can take months. And agents are just the very first gate. Being agented can be lightyears away from getting published.<p>And after so many layers of gatekeeping and due process, what got to the shelves are like, uh, <i>Kiss of the Basilisk</i>. I mean it totally makes sense in from a marketing perspective, but the whole situation is a little bit funny.<p>[0]: used as a neutral term, not a negative one
4/22/2026, 7:43:11 PM
by: -warren
This is a great blog post and very sound advice.<p>I, however, miss twitter's "twitterness". 140 characters and a link.
4/22/2026, 8:03:31 PM
by: neko_ranger
It's only a failure if you give up and stop moving
4/22/2026, 8:28:42 PM
by: vynase
There’s one person I really wish still posted here. He’d light this place up.
4/22/2026, 8:32:25 PM
by: andrewstuart
When anyone rejects you for any reason, job, dating whatever, don’t even ask why it is irrelevant and meaningless information. People rarely if ever are truly honest about why, and even if they were, who cares, move on to someone who accepts you.<p>Different story if it’s family/friend - if you know them personally.
4/22/2026, 8:30:19 PM
by: virgil_disgr4ce
Also Orson Scott Card:<p>"If America becomes a place where our children are taken from us by law and forced to attend schools where they are taught that cohabitation is as good as marriage, that motherhood doesn’t require a husband or father, and that homosexuality is as valid a choice as heterosexuality for their future lives, then why in the world should married people continue to accept the authority of such a government?" [1]<p>"The dark secret of homosexual society —the one that dares not speak its name —is how many homosexuals first entered into that world through a disturbing seduction or rape or molestation or abuse, and how many of them yearn to get out of the homosexual community and live normally." [2]<p>"In fact, the scientific evidence we have points in the opposite direction: Same-sex attraction is not a strait jacket; people’s desires change over time; gay people still have choices; a reproductive dysfunction like same-sex attraction is not a death sentence for your DNA or for your desire to have a family in which children grow up with male and female parents to model appropriate gender roles." [3]<p>"I find the comparison between civil rights based on race and supposed new rights being granted for what amounts to deviant behavior to be really kind of ridiculous. There is no comparison. A black as a person does not by being black harm anyone. Gay rights is a collective delusion that’s being attempted. And the idea of ‘gay marriage’—it’s hard to find a ridiculous enough comparison." [4]<p>[1] <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20090122061141/http://mormontimes.com/mormon_voices/?id=3237" rel="nofollow">http://web.archive.org/web/20090122061141/http://mormontimes...</a><p>[2] <a href="http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2004-02-15-1.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2004-02-15-1.html</a> [original link now broken]<p>[3] <a href="http://greensboro.rhinotimes.com/hc.e.211703.lasso" rel="nofollow">http://greensboro.rhinotimes.com/hc.e.211703.lasso</a> [original link now broken]<p>[4] <a href="http://www.salon.com/2000/02/03/card" rel="nofollow">http://www.salon.com/2000/02/03/card</a>
4/22/2026, 7:36:43 PM