When editors just aren’t that into you

You may be doing everything right and still never hear back from an editor on an assignment that you thought was a done deal. And oh, how it stings.

Sports writer Paul Lukas shared his frustration with the situation in this post on his Uni-Watch blog recently. Lukas had been excited about an opportunity for an ongoing gig, then didn’t hear back from the editor, followed up and still didn’t hear back. Things went south from there.

In a way, relationships with editors are like dating someone – you might be a lot more into them than they are in you. For a lot of different reasons, including some you’ll never know.

And that reminds me of a story.

A Sad Tale of Love and Woe

Once upon a time, I liked a guy. Let’s call him Frank. I’d known Frank in college, and this was a year or so later. His long-time serious girlfriend had broken up with him, and I’d broken up with the guy I was seeing, and we started dating. We’d been in a class together, knew the same people. He was smart and funny. Pretty quickly we started hanging out a lot. It was good.

After a month, maybe two, Frank went away for the weekend to visit friends. He called once to say hi – this was before chatrooms, cellphones or texting, so a call was nice. We talked about getting together after he was back.

And that was it. I never heard from him again. No call, no letter. No nothing. I had no idea what happened, and was too proud, hurt, confused and gutless to call him or his friends to find out.

Flash forward a year. My former college roommate was visiting and we decided to get a beer at a bar near campus that was a popular while we were in school. We walked in and there’s Frank. With all his friends. They’re not just drinking. It’s a bachelor party. His bachelor party. Frank is getting married – to his old girlfriend, I hear from the one friend brave enough to talk to me. Frank won’t look in my direction.

Flash forward a couple more years to a college reunion, and I run into Frank. This time, I’m not afraid to talk. I tell him he was a jerk. He agrees. He also tells me after he got back from that weekend away, he heard from his old girlfriend. She told him she’d made a terrible mistake, still loved him, and proposed. And he said yes. And that was that.

Why I’m Publicly Sharing a Humiliating Story

I don’t think about that particularly humbling chapter of my life often. But I do when I hear stories like Paul Lukas’ of the editor he was so keen to work with, the one who initially encouraged him then essentially dropped off the face of the earth.

In writing as in love, things can go bad and you don’t always know why.

Often, it has nothing to do with you. The editor who was so enthusiastic about a future project may have had her freelance budget cut in half. Perhaps the publication’s entire editorial budget has been chopped and she’s out of a job. Maybe a new editor in chief’s come on board, changed the publication’s direction and killed any story pitches that were in the queue. Maybe the editor loved the column, op-ed or story you pitched, but got shot down in the editorial planning meeting. Maybe they woke up after meeting with you and realized the idea that sounded great over coffee wasn’t a good fit for her section after all.

It could be number of things. That’s not an excuse for giving you the silent treatment. Maybe they’re like Frank, too embarrassed or gutless to follow up. Or maybe that’s just the way they roll – in which case you might be better off not working with them. I’ve had editors who, like Frank, who popped into and then out of my life without so much as a goodbye, only to show up again later on with a plausible explanation for what happened. I’ve had others who I never heard from again. It happens.

More on Editors and Writers

Here are some other posts I’ve written about writer-editor relationships:

• 7 secrets about editors every freelancer should know
• 10 ways to make editors fall in love with your work
• Surefire ways to make editors get back to you faster
• 25 reasons editors don’t get back to writers faster
• I love editors who….

[Flickr photo courtesy Lovelorn Poets]