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Recently, I got two times rejection for my paper from two different reputed journals of Mathematics fields. The first time, I received two review reports in which both reviewers gave detailed comments with decision of major revision. But the paper got rejected by the handling editor of the journal.

Before going for a second submission (new journal), I tried my best to implement the comments of the reviewers of my first submission. This time again I got two review reports in which the first one suggested me to go for minor revision, while I received negative comments from the second reviewer. The second review says that my methods do not offer very much of an advantage over some of the existing classical methods. Also, it argues that no comparison is done with them.

Now, I am worried whether to submit this paper in a reputed journal or an average ranking journal. I am totally appalled by addressing their comments. What am I supposed to do in such circumstances?

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    Do you have a coauthor which is more senior than you? Or any advisor? If not, anyone in your institution which is familiar with the field? I suppose their opinion will be more valuable/relevant.
    – Arctic Char
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 7:44
  • @JohnMa Yes, I have. In fact, one of the coauthor has published more than two hundred research papers having total impact points more than 150.
    – mathscrazy
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 7:47
  • Then IMO you can just count on that coauthor on choosing journal.
    – Arctic Char
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 7:56
  • @JohnMa I want to know what others do in such a circumstances? What else I could do? What would be appropriate from general perspective? Thank you for your reply.
    – mathscrazy
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 7:58
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    I am not sure I see the issue here. The reviewer points out important problems with the paper and the editor agreed and rejected the paper. So fix those problems and submit it a new place.
    – Tobias Kildetoft
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 13:55

2 Answers 2

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You seem confused by the fact that one of the reviewers only suggested minor edits whereas the other was quite against the whole thing. As an editor, I see this all the time -- and typically, it means that I chose the first reviewer poorly and that the second reviewer really knows the field, knows the other methods that are used today, and can compare what's proposed in the paper with what's being used today. The first one may have tangential knowledge of the field, but not enough overview to recognize that the method is not new.

In other words, to avoid a repeat, you do well to think about whether the second reviewer may be correct. If she is, you would do well to figure out what you think what is new about the paper, and whether that is sufficient to justify publication. An experienced co-author or colleague can certainly help you with this, and you should schedule some discussions about this topic before you think about where to re-submit the paper.

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Good journals get much more submisions than they could possibly publish. In that case it is the reviewer's job to inspect each single submission in isolation to see if it is of suitable quality, and the editor's job to look at all suitable submissions and select the best. So it is perfectly possible for the reviewers to suggest a revise and resubmit and the editor decides to reject because there is so many better (in her/his view) submissions on her/his desk.

There is no general answer to what your next step should be other than talk to someone that knows your article and your field, as was already suggested in the comments.

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