Shortlisted

Well, well, well. I was one of the six winners at the Novel Matters Audience With an Agent contest. The six lovely ladies who write for that blog (and who are all with the Books & Such Literary Agency) sifted through a slush pile of applicants and selected six to be forwarded to agent Wendy Lawton.

OK, you might be saying, why do you need a contest to query an agent? And the answer is: you don't, of course. But I suspect an agent is going to take a closer, harder, longer look at queries (complete with synopses and first chapters) that come with a recommendation from six people whose taste in writing she respects. She is also promising feedback, something you don't normally get with a query. So I am well-pleased, and very grateful to have been selected.

And, as any writer knows, a shot of affirmation now and then is a wonderful thing. Especially when it comes from professionals.

Contest for science fiction/fantasy writers

Tor UK, an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, is holding a contest, War of the Words, to find the next big thing in SFF. That's science fiction and fantasy, for the uninitiated, but if you didn't know that, this blog post probably isn't for you anyway. ;o)



You need to have a completed manuscript in the 80-150K range, plus a full synopsis (they still haven't defined what they mean by that, but I'm guessing that 1-2 page deal isn't going to cut it). You have until August 20 to submit the synopsis and the first three chapters.

We had a rather lengthy discussion on the contract terms over at A Dribble of Ink and have more or less come to the conclusion that it would be a decent contract. Victoria Strauss of Writers Beware has given it her Imprimatur in a private email too, so go ahead, send in your opus. There's no entry fee, so what have you got to lose?

From first to last

Noveldoctor has a contest going on. He provides a choice of first lines and a choice of last lines, you provide the words in between, to a maximum of 400. And he's actually got real prizes.

It's all for the fun of it more than anything else, as well as learning how to get from Point A to Point B, but it looks like fun. Entries have to be in by the 31st so sharpen your cyberpencils and start typing.

And subscribe to his blog while you're at it. It's fun and useful. Well, sometimes it's useful.