There are style manuals? Who knew?
I had the same problem with a story that I submitted to a publication. The comments came back and they wanted to change everything. It was clear they had completely missed the point of the piece. I stuck to my idea, published it on here and it did very nicely, thank you. I also write another article about being rejected which did even better.
Try the website Submissable for possible markets for your story.
Great post as always.