In part, the article says, "In an e-mail message, the novelist Roxana Robinson recalled collecting some “wildly infuriating refusals.” One author declined her request by saying, “I’m such a slow reader, I won’t be able to give your book the careful attention it deserves” — despite the fact that the manuscript was “sent out several decades before the blurb deadline,” she said. But her “top all-time most frustrating response was ‘I’m really sorry, but I think it would be inappropriate for me to blurb your book, because you’re so distinguished.’ ”"
I was once turned down by Susan Issacs when I asked for a blurb. She said she didn't like to read others' work when she was writing, for fear it might influence her own voice. What a well-thought out rejection!
