Fear and Loathing Conquered, Writing Contests Entered

For my own good, I ignored my biases and held my nose. Then I went to work polishing and creating loglines.

And then I entered two separate contests over the past couple weeks.

As I’ve discussed before, I’m not a fan of writing contests, but I recently came to accept these as a necessary reality in the world of publishing when you’re an unknown author trying to create a name and market for yourself.

Parts of “Dead Odds” now sit with the judges and editors and agents of contests held by the Florida Chapter of the Mystery Writers of America and by the Authoress of Miss Snark’s First Victim.

Both are progressive contests, which means you have to get through stages to win. Winning is different for each.

THE FREDDIE AND THE BAKER’S DOZEN

In the case of the Freddie, the name of the new award for unpublished mystery works, the number of 20-page entries are unlimited. The initial goal is to make it into the top five. From there, the judges (agents) will go to work and name winners — who gets a Freddie award.

As for the Baker’s Dozen, the contest run by Miss Snark’s First Victim, you enter a logline plus the first 250 words of your polished manuscript. Soon, out of 100 entrants (the number is capped), 25 adult fiction submissions will move to the next stage — an auction among agents. During the auction, agents compete on which submissions they want to see more of. And then they can request more pages or a full manuscript.

Winning the Baker’s Dozen means having an agent signing you. Anything gained short of that helps with confidence and a morale boost. Ultimately, though, it ends with some level of rejection.

But this is the game. This is the world of traditional publishing.