Rejected: Tales of the Failed, Dumped, and Canceled

by Jon Friedman (Editor), Various

Besides being born and dying, the most common human experience is being rejected–dissed, dumped on, or downsized–by lovers, parents, and employers. Now here’s a hilarious collection of rejection stories–and rejected works–by some of today’s most accomplished comic writers and performers (some world famous) sharing their pieces that were ripped to pieces and their own experiences of being handed their hats, heads, and hearts on a platter.

• Bob Witfong recalls being hired as a correspondent by The Daily Show but never called in to work; then being fired by mistake; then going on air and called “creepy” by bloggers; and then actually being fired.

• Meredith Hoffa has her pubescent crush destroyed by a new haircut modeled on Mary Stuart Masterson’ s in Some Kind of Wonderful just when “the size of my face and body had caught up to the gigantic size of my teeth.”

• Joel Stein (celebrity interviewer for Time) receives an earful from Buddy Hackett who, before slamming down the phone, “You’re being kind of, what do you call it, I don’t know, those wise-guy papers? Tabloids.”

• Dave Hill offers his piece for a British “lad” mag in which he went undercover with a police vice squad, an article killed because he didn’t go “far enough” with a transvestite prostitute.

• Jackie Cohen fails her audition for the synagogue choir–at age five.

• And many more too painful to mention.

Featuring essays, jokes, sketches, cartoons, and articles passed on by venues as varied as Saturday Night Live and Reader’s Digest , Rejected is a priceless compilation that reminds us it’s a-okay to be a big loser.

Praise for Rejected

“The overall quality of the work is remarkable; Friedman allows his writers immense latitude in style and substance while keeping his theme front and center. [ Rejected ] has something for everyone, laughs on just about every page, and an ultimately uplifting spirit; if every rejection is an opportunity, then the chance to be a part of this fine, funny collaboration was probably worth it—especially for readers.”— Publishers Weekly

“No one has ever made being a reject this funny! If you read only one book this year about being a total loser, make it this one.”— Lizz Winstead, founding member of Air America Radio and co-creator of The Daily Show

“This book shows that we are truly living in bizarro world where the rejected should be the accepted and the accepted should be . . . anyway, this is an awesome and wonderfully comedic book.”— Jonathan Ames, author of The Alcoholic

“I’d like to thank the contributors for their humiliation, pain and suffering, because it sure makes for a funny book.”— A.J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically

Genres: Humor, Nonfiction, Essays, Short Stories, Memoir

252 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Jon Friedman is a comedian, writer, and producer best known for The Rejection Show. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, as well as on NPR and ABC News. He lives in New York.

Reviews

[Angela · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was not funny and I could understand why almost every story or writing had been rejected. A quick read, but a waste of time.

[Scott Campbell · Rating 3 out of 5]

The pieces in this book can be divided into two classes: works that were rejected and stories about the author's experiences getting rejected. For the most part, I can understand why many of the pieces in the first group were rejected. The pieces in the second group were usually, but not always, better. The best pieces are Kevin McDonald's The El Mocambo Bomb, Rob Klein's Stephen Colbert Fan Fiction, Ellie Kemper's Vladimir Putin piece and Jen Kirkman's Moby Dick. The rest of the pieces ranged from kind of funny to not very good.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comedy writers submit works rejected from various Holy Grails of comedy, like The New Yorker Shouts and Murmurs, SNL, etc. If you get through the whole book, I guarantee there will be moments where you will bray like a hyena. Sometimes the story will be one of humiliation and rejection, arrogance of youth followed by a great fall, or sometimes a gem that got dropped for no reason and deserves revival from extinction in these pages. Jordan Roter: "My agent stopped calling me back. The death rattle that is her voice mail haunts me like the twisted laugh track of my career nightmare. I needed some control. Somebody had to pay. I knew where I had to go: Pottery Barn. (To get cash out of $200 worth of gift certificates). (p. 106).

[Laren · Rating 2 out of 5]

The title and summary promise tales of rejection from people who ultimately triumphed over it. And the people are comedy writers so they ought to be fun to read, rigt? Well, some of the essays truly are such tales showing the person(s) sense of humor about it. However, others are simply showcases of rejected material where in many cases you can understand the rejection, so that made for a very uneven reading experience. There are some truly funny gems here though, and the not-so-good stuff is brief enough to make it worth the read.

[Katie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've given up on this book just a few pieces from the end. I thought it would be funny STORIES of rejection, instead many of the essays are actual rejected pieces. What I have learned is that pieces that are rejected are rejected for a reason, mostly that they are not very good. Yargh! Don't waste your time. I have to imagine there are better, funnier, more interesting studies of rejection out there, and even ones that weren't actually rejected.

[Nathan Rose · Rating 2 out of 5]

There's a pretty good reason most of this stuff was rejected. I understand trying to provide contrast by putting serious crud along with mediocre crud, but in the end it was just mostly crud. A few fantastic (or partially fantastic) things, but I thought the point was to show that true genius was contained in the stuff that's cast aside.

I wish I could attend the Cartoon Limbo exhibit, however. I think the concept is fascinating.

[Marci · Rating 3 out of 5]

Funny, enjoyable comedy read that is easy to do in spurts. A couple of the submissions were not that entertaining and you clearly understood why they were rejected. It's very evident these individuals have lots of intestinal fortitude and wit. This book made me laugh at times, but humor that makes one person laugh may cause another to say "I don't think that's very funny."

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Any meta-point the editor (Friedman) is trying to make about the nature of rejection is largely lost, but there are plenty of gems in this collection. Fully half of them are self-indulgent pablum, but the rest are wickedly funny. Be advised that the "neurotic thirty-something Brooklynite comedienne with a failed one-woman show" demographic is drastically overrepresented.

[Bunny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad. Easy read, some of them were funnier than others (The guys from The State were decent). Most of the stories, you really understand why they were rejected. But it's still fun to read the stuff you don't normally get to see in publications.

[Jennifer Saranow Schultz]

Jackie Cohen, my college roommate and a former book club member who nows is in public health school at Johns Hopkins, has an essay in this. Yay Jackie.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hilarious rejected letters, magazine submissions, life experiences.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

About 1/3 of the entries were interesting; the rest tried too hard.

[Michelle · Rating 1 out of 5]

its like watching late night with jimmy fallon. i miss conan. two more weeks...

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

this book is hilarious! jen kirkman is the man!

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh.

[Mardy Grzegorek · Rating 2 out of 5]

Loved it. We've all been there in one way or another. This book makes it ok to suck once in awhile.

[Mardy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it. we have all been there at least once in our lives. Nice to know everybody sucks at least once. Plus this book makes the pain funny and somehow the outcome is always better.

[Bella Haro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, true life stories. Some funny, others pretty depressing.

[Devon · Rating 4 out of 5]

While it's not the most even anthology, the highlights stand well enough to leave a great impression.

[Aleesa Sutton]

Too racy and profane for me.

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very entertaining collection of rejection stories from writers and actors.