And Now a little grousing from our writer.

Grrrr.

yup, that about sums it up. A few months ago, I submitted an entry to the Amazon.com writing contest. I followed their rules, met their deadlines, blah, blah blah.

I just received a rejection email from them today. Now over the years, I've gotten pretty used to rejection. Some people/things don't click. I accept that. Their reason for rejecting me?

"Reason for ineligibility: Your excerpt could not be opened for review (e.g., excerpt was corrupted, locked or in an otherwise unreadable document format) "

My submission was a standard Microsoft doc, nothing wacky. Hell, it's what they asked for. So maybe the file became corrupt in sending. It happens, but don't you think they should allow a window for a re-submission?

We wish you best of luck with your writing endeavors in the future.

I guess not. Of course this leaves them vulnerable, because how can they prove "corrupt entry." and what if mine isn't the only one? What if every entry is mysteriously corrupt except for one? What kind of safety do the writers have in place? It makes you wonder. A more paranoid person than myself could cause them lots of trouble.

I don't care too much. They rejected it because they can't open a file. How could I trust them to read it once it was open? I'm in the process of reaping through my book with a sickle anyway. What they have, is the original book. It was more a literary effort. I'm going to hone it into a mainstream work and try to sell it again. It's not the original vision, but if it gets people to read it, I think that was my original idea.

I'm just frustrated because Amazon.com didn't even try to open the submission until 2 months after the deadline. It's not a fair contest.

But it was free, and so fair is as fair as free can afford.