Rejection #3

Dear Mr. Azar:

Thank you for your interest in publication with Drollerie Press. Unfortunately, LIQUID MARBLE is not quite right for us at this time. We wish you every success in finding a home for it. That said, I really enjoyed certain aspects of your voice and hope you will submit to us again.

Sincerely,

***** ******

Senior Editor,

Vice President of Communications

Liquid Marble is the first story I wrote for a series of paranormal detective stories about a character I have. I'm very happy with the development of the series, and plan on putting together anywhere between 12-15 stories about this one character into a single book. This series has been my focus for the past bit, and while I'm disappointed that it was rejected, but am glad of the encouraging words. I currently have another of the detective stories submitted to the same publisher, lets hope that it doesn't join this list of rejections.

Teen Moms

I've only recently stumbled upon this show, so for those of you who don't know it "Teen Moms" is an MTV 'reality' show that follows several teenage mother.

The notion of glamorizing teenage pregnancy and parenthood is appalling.  Some might make the argument that the point of the show is to display the struggles these girls are going through or some such crap, but it's telling girls that its OK to spread your legs when you don't know any better, MTV will put you TV.  The show is called a documentary, but its watched for entertainment purposes.  I see people posting about it on Facebook, gossiping about it like its a daytime soap opera, doesn't seem like the point of a 'documentary'.

Everyone keeps saying they feel bad for the moms, but they put themselves in the situation they're in.  Feel bad for the kids people.  We always hear about the tragic lives of child actors, just imagine how much worse it's going to be for these kids, literally being born on MTV.  What kind of lives are they destined to have?

Ask yourselves this, will this show help the teen pregnancy rate? And if not why is this show on the air?

Heartbroken MP3 Player

Apparently, my MP3 player either just went through a bad break up that I don't know about, or it likes to rub in the fact that i'm single.  The following are the last ten songs it played in order.

The Police - Bed's Too Big Without You
Portishead - Sour Times
Case - I'm Missing You
Bobby Darin - Lover Come Back to Me
Mary J Blige - Ain't Really Love
Al Green - Tired of Being Alone
Solomon Burke - Let Somebody Love Me
Placebo - Without You I'm Nothing
Eisley - I Wasn't Prepared
Prodigy - Smack My Bitch Up

Oddly enough I felt better once the Prodigy song played... not that I'd ever condone that.

Rejection Letter #2

The first letter I posted was the first rejection I received, but moving forward, I'll be posting them in no particular order. Frankly, I can't recall what order they came in.


Alex Azar,

Thank you for your giving us the opportunity to read No Lights. Sadly, we regret to inform you that we are declining acceptance at this time. The idea was very interesting and we could see the inspiration from the Slaves on Dope song, but overall we felt the story itself wasn’t quite the right fit for Rock is Dead. Thank you again and we wish you the best of luck placing this story in another market. We do our best to reply in a timely manner so please report our response time at Duotrope’s Digest http://www.duotrope.com.
****** & ******


This story was doomed to be rejected for this particular anthology from the moment I submitted it.  The anthology was calling for dark/horror stories that were inspired by music.  And while I still feel the story fits the theme of the anthology, it was not inspired by any song in particular.  I had to google random themes from the story and find a song that could fit.  I found a song called Kafka Bug by Slaves on Dope, a song I never heard of before, and not really the type of song I like, but again it fit.  I don't know if the editors were able to tell that I put that together last minute, or if they actually felt that the story wasn't quite right.


In any case, I still like the story and currently have it out for a different submission.  If it doesn't make it, I'll post it here.

Nerds, Geeks, and Dorks

I'm not sure when society forgot the original meanings of these words, but they've been devolved into a synonymous equivalent for loser.  These three terms are vastly different, and not necessary tied together.  Allow me to explain;

Nerds are those that are naturally book smart, usually to an annoying degree.  Nothing inherently 'uncool' about them.

Geeks are people fanatical about a certain subject; i.e. Star Wars, comic books, or the like.  While typically viewed in a negative light, some forms of 'geekness' are socially acceptable.  These accepted geeks normally have the approved qualifier attached to their title, such as a music geek, or movie geek.

Dorks are individuals with little or no social skills, and are closest to the aforementioned loser.

While anyone can be one, all, or any combination of these three, people are not mutually all or none.  I, for one, am a nerd (as this post painfully demonstrates) and a geek, however I am not socially awkward, not a dork.

So next time you decide to call someone a geek, make sure you don't mean dork.

This public service announcement is brought to you by Azar Rising.

Anger Management

Being the first of a 26 story project I wasn’t sure how this would play out. I spent 6 days wrestling with ideas for the story, then on the 7^th and final day settled on the story and wrote it within half an hour. The version you see below, is very similar with minor grammatical edits from the original story I wrote in those 30 minutes. The story is rather graphic, and not for everyone.

Anger Management

“Like I said I’m only here because that jerk off of a boss knows if he fires me I’ll tell the truth about him cheating on his wife, with my fucking wife. That’s right, that fucker was fucking my wife on his ‘lunch break,’ while I was working like a witless pencil pusher for that dickless prick. I know, I know ‘calm down’ right? This is a court ordered session. I don’t know what the fuck for, he deserves more than the beat down that I gave him last month. Doc, can you honestly blame a hardworking guy like me, after finding out my wife was cheating on me with my boss? Shit the bitch deserves a beating also, but I can’t go to jail for that cunt.

“You know doc, I never thought a shrink could look so damn hot. Or do you use those tits of yours to get dicks like me to start talking? Shit I’d tell you my account number if you asked. Not that you’d need it with the prices crooks like you charge.

“Yea I know this is about me, not you. Well, I’ll admit I always had some anger problems, I guess. Dumb guys like me gotta use our fists cuz the only thing we do know is that our brains don’t get the job done.

“You’re probably gonna go on, bout how this is all my pop’s fault. Well yea, he was a mean son of a bitch, who raised me at the end of a belt, the shiny metal end, but that’s how my old man taught me these two here are my only friends. Oops, sorry guess they’re still a little wet. But these fists have been through a lot of shit in my years.

“Guess you want to know my first show of anger, first time I went in the red, huh? Well let’s see, probably have to be with Rocco. I was round nine er ten, and that fucking mutt would not learn to piss on the papers, and my fuckin’ mah kept beatin’ my ass for it, so I beat my dog’s ass. But the fucker wouldn’t learn, so I nuked his ass. No, no, don’t get weirded out, we were gonna toss the microwave out anyway. Well, I learned later in life it was probably cuz that shit was still scared of the new home or something, but whatever.

“And well I guess it didn’t end there, shit I don’t think the anger even paused. I got suspended the next year from school for beatin the shit out of some punk in school for talking shit bout my mah. It’s not even cuz I cared bout her or what he said was all that mean, it’s just the principle of the matter. You don’t talk bout some ones mah, and not expect an ass beatin’. You know what I’m saying?

“Huh? No answer, guess you want deeper. Well I could remember this one time, I nearly killed a cabbie cuz he purposefully avoided my directions so he could hit traffic and suck an extra 20 bucks from me. What’s funny is that when I was slammin the door on his head, I knew I was going over board but I couldn’t stop. It was the one time I thought, ‘I probably shouldn’t be doing this.’ From then on, I kinda held on, knowing it was the only option for a lug like me.

“You’re probably gonna ask or say something bout how I keep putting myself down, but it ain’t like that. I know where my strengths are, and my brains ain’t one of them. But my fists and my anger are my strengths. I once ki… I never told nobody this before, least not without a couple a drinks, but I killed a guy once in a bar fight. He bumped into me and tried starting some shit, so I beat him to death with a pool stick. I knew the bartender, so he let me take the body outta the bar before he called the cops and gave a shitty description of me. I gotta say though, it felt good beatin him and killin him, but it feels even better knowin I got away with it.

“You know doc, I know my times bout up, but I really feel like I got a lot of this bottled up shit out in the open. I just wish ya hadn’t said nothing bout me being unbalanced or nothing when I first got in. You might still be alive, and I definitely wouldn’t a had to rape you. But I guess I better get going before they start wonderin’ bout you. Reckon I won’t be seein you ‘gain, but I’ll always remember your naked limp body, even if your face is all bloody. Think I’ll take some of what I learned here home to my wife.”

By,

Alex Azar

Alphabet Project

Several years ago I began a project to write a flash fiction story for every letter in the alphabet by randomly choosing the title from a topic book.  Initially the plan was to do one every week, and that worked for the first few weeks.  However, after 'C' I decided I wanted to write something else and the letters began falling by the wayside.  Since, I've written several more of the letters, and overall am pleased with the way this is coming about.  As I continue to produce these stories I will post them here, potentially compiling a book of all the stories.

The stories range in all types of genres and writing styles, and even my first non-fiction piece.  I'll post them once a week. Giving a little intro or end notes with each of them.


I'll begin by posting 'A' immediately after this.
Have a good one.

First Rejection Letter

This rejection is by far the one that stands out most in my mind, and not just because it was the first rejection letter I received. It reads as follows;

Dear Mr. Azar,

Thank you for sending us an inquiry letter. While we admire your dedication to the craft, we must pass at this time. We wish you the best in your future endeavors and encourage you to submit again as you continue to refine your work.

Due to the heavy volume of submissions we receive, please wait at least six months before resubmitting, and as per our new guidelines, please direct all future submissions to the Writer-Recruiter.

Best,

************

Writer-Recruiter

The reason this letter stands out so much to me is because they never mention what piece of work I sent them an inquiry letter for, and there was no return address on the envelope. The zip code is even cut off in the postage so all I can tell is that it was sent from somewhere in New York.

Too curious about it to pass it up, I googled the name of the 'writer-recruiter' and the only definitive match I was able to find was a guy on Yahoo Answers asking who she was. He states he received a letter exactly as the one I did.

It's a mystery that has yet to be solved, and perhaps I will submit something to them again, but I won't even know it.

Welcome to the World of Azar Rising

What is Azar Rising? This is a chroniclization of the journey I take of becoming a published author and beyond.

I'll post each of my rejection letters, and in time even my acceptance letters. I'll also post short flash fiction stories, sections of longer works, random musings that are standard blog fare and anything else that I find interesting.

I write mysteries, horror, thrillers, comics, poems, and a little bit of everything else. Hopefully, I'll be able to display some of all of that here. Some of it may disturb you, some might make you laugh, maybe even cry, but I doubt it.

With that being said, I leave you with a little internet gem to set the mood for things to come.

Have a good one.