"good" rejection?

[thisquiethour]

I have only sent out a few queries--got a few rejections, a few I haven't heard back from, and one that said he "wasn't taken with it as he needed to be" --so can I count that one as a "positive rejection" or is that pretty standard?

[mindym]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but that sounds a little form-ish -- most agents are just better at professionalism/being nice than others!

A personalised rejection usually comments on some aspect of your work (i.e., I have too many heaven/hell stories at the moment to take another one on).

[jcwrites]

Form rejection.

(sorry)

[Tabris]

Yeah, form. It's designed not to be argued with.

If the response doesn't say anything about your specific book, assume it came out of a can.

[littlewritings]

I second that... If an agent doesn't mention something very specific from your book, it's probably a form rejection.

(There are also some agents who have something like "Please keep me in mind for future projects" or "While I found your premise intriguing..." as part of their form rejection and that sort of makes it look like it's personalized, but it often isn't.)