>The VQR Blog offers a selection of submission readers’ comments. It is either (a) comforting to know that even bad submissions are closely read and quickly eliminated, or (b) disturbing to think what the readers are saying about my submissions. I’ve never submitted a bawdy limerick to VQR, let me just say.
>I think you can safely choose “A” here, Cliff. 🙂 There’s just that tiny percentage of submissions that are totally terrible. Or, in the case of some of these submissions, simply trigger a pet peeve of a reader.
Incidentally, we have a fiction piece in our next issue that was rejected by the readers. Just because a reader dislikes something doesn’t mean it’s bad (I hope that’s obvious :), and doesn’t mean it won’t get published by us.
>Actually I would have thought the totally terrible percentage would be higher; at least that’s what writers tell themselves in order to feel better about the acceptance rate of under 1% that most journals have.
Having been a reader for a journal I know that the reader’s opinion doesn’t always carry the day. Good thing there are multiple sets of eyes.
The pet peeve point is a good one. As a reader (and also as a reader) there are things that bother me that probably no one else cares about . . .