# Rejection (short story collection)

Rejection is a 2024 short story collection by Thai American writer Tony Tulathimutte, published by William Morrow and Company. Considered a novel-in-stories, the book includes pieces which Tulathimutte had published in magazines like N+1 and The Paris Review, including the highly controversial story "The Feminist". It was longlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction.

## Content

Tulathimutte, while at the Iowa Writers' Workshop in 2011, came up with the idea for a book titled Rejection while lying face-down in bed. Just a year before, in 2010, Tulathimutte had started writing stories that intertwined identity politics with comedy.
Considered a novel-in-stories, the book comprises seven stories. The first three stories, "The Feminist", "Pics", and "Ahegao" compose a "trilogy" of "different types of rejection." In the second half of the book, Tulathimutte explores more metafictional and experimental forms with "Main Character", "Our Dope Future"—which takes the form of a Reddit post—"Sixteen Metaphors", and "Re:Rejection", a story in the form of a letter which rejects the book being read. Tulathimutte cited "The Depressed Person" by David Foster Wallace and The Easter Parade by Richard Yates as inspirations for the short story collection.
"The Feminist", a story about a male feminist who becomes misogynistic after a series of rejections, was originally written from 2011 to 2013, with Tulathimutte knowing that it would be part of a "half fiction and half nonfiction" book in the future. The nonfiction half would eventually split off and become "The Rejection Plot" published in The Paris Review in 2024. In 2019, "The Feminist" would be published by N+1 to much controversy, leading Tulathimutte to tweet "feminism is good, this character is not good." In winter of 2023, "Ahegao" was published in The Paris Review.

## Critical Reception

According to Book Marks, the book received a "rave" consensus, based on thirteen critic reviews: nine "rave", two "positive", and two "mixed". In the March–April 2025 issue of Bookmarks, the book was rated four out of five. The magazine's critical summary reads: "A wonderful collection not for everyone".
Publishers Weekly and The New York Times included the book on their respective Best Books of 2024 lists. Esquire listed it as a Best Book of Fall 2024. Time called the book one of the 100 must-reads of 2024.
Critics lauded Tulathimutte's handling of topics like loneliness, sexuality, dating, positionality, and, per the book's namesake, rejection. The book received a starred review from Publishers Weekly, which called the book "a first-rate exploration of yearning and solitude." Dwight Garner, for The New York Times, lauded Tulathimutte's approach to identity politics and the cultural zeitgeist, stating: "Tulathimutte is a big talent and he is clearly just getting started." Many critics, including Garner, found Tulathimutte's writing captivating in its ability to balance intelligence, vulgarity, and humor. The New Yorker, in particular, wrote that it was "fun ... to read a book about a bunch of huge fucking losers." Similarly, in a starred review, Kirkus Reviews praised the book as "an inventive and shameless story collection for the chronically online."
Several publications have investigated the book's possible status as an incel novel, while others have used terms like terminally online and brain rot to describe the context of Tulathimutte's work. However, The Cut found that online communities on 4chan and Reddit had mixed reactions to the book.