I have recently finished wading through a pile of submissions that I evaluated for a writing contest. Do not let this happen to you. Even if the money sounds good, there is no way it's worth your time because you will grossly underestimate how long it takes to fill out response forms. Even if it's been a few years since you worked the slush pile, and you're feeling charitable, do not do it. The only reason to consider reading for a contest is to gain valuable thoughts about effective writing contest submissions. I've saved you the trouble.
Valuable Thoughts About Effective Writing Contest Submissions
1) There are lots of spunky, financially independent, 40-50 year old recently divorced/widowed sculptress/artist/writer protagonists. If you have one in your novel, she had better be something really, really special.
2) Proofread your freaking thing. If you don't want to spend time reading Elements of Style, then hire someone who has to proofread your freaking thing.
3) Don't kill anyone in your sample if you can at all help it – your time with a reader is too short for it to not come across as melodramatic.
4) Don't include ANY exposition or backstory no matter how crucial you think it is for the reader to understand your character. You would much rather have a reader running hard to catch up than slogging through exposition.
5) Don't withhold in the synopsis. Don't allude to "a shocking event that suddenly rocks Doris's world." Say what it is. You are not shooting for suspense with a contest reader. You want him or her to have a sense of the larger narrative. If you don't know where the story is going beyond your sample, pretend you do, then allow that to change completely as you write.
6) Don't put pictures or clip art or funky fonts or any other garbage like that in either the synopsis or the sample. Don't get cute.
7) No suicide.
8) Don't use first person, unless the voice in your head is keeping you up at night. And even in that case, you might just be crazy. If you can sit down to write that book in any other POV than first person, then you should. Only if that voice is completely insistent (just short of psychosis) should you write in first person.
9) Avoid figurative language (metaphor, simile, haiku, whatever). I know this sounds crazy for a creative writing contest, but you can take my word for it. Unless you are being intentionally bad or undermining a character's credibility, do not say that something is "like" something else. Skip it. This almost always backfires on the aspiring writer.
10) Writing contests are a crapshoot, and you should never take the comments or feedback very much to heart because in all likelihood they are written by some old crank who's grumpy because he agreed to read manuscripts when he'd rather be watching basketball.
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Comments: 29
Thanks Clay! If I ever loose my marbles and try to write a novel I'll remember these points. I have an opponent to number 8 on your lists of your thoughts.
Read here if you have the time.
http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474976991765
The worst part was that half the critique had to be about something positive in each of the plays. Well, good thing I'm a good B-ESSer because there is absolutely no way anyone else would have been able to work such an angle!
I really took the job because, like you, I wanted to get a feel for writing a screen play. Now I at least have the feel for how NOT to write one, I guess!
John--You still use a quill? Cool. ;)
Sue -- I think any reader expected to respond directly to the writer should have the option to politely "lose" up to 5% of the submitted manuscripts to avoid having to cook up something nice to say about a complete piece of crap.
I even put aside an anticipated book if my mood isn't right.
Thanks for the laugh.
As a horror publisher, I would replace young spunky 40-50 yr old with the following:
A sexy angst-ridden vampire in love with a spunky flame-haired (or raven-haired) artist/sculture/writer.
Is the world filled with so much bad writing that you've been turned off to judging writing contests?
Good luck with your contest, Aaron.
Thanks for lighting, fit's.
It's true -there's no money in it, compared to the hours you must dedicate.
At this point in life, shouldn't we be earning a bit more than... wait staff?
(After all , there's no tipping)
Ultimately it must be a labor of love with the perk of "some " compensation.
I edit and review poetry submissions and it can be quite a chore.
My pet peeve : poets who think writing with punctuation is old fashioned and uncool. Oh... and there's one more thing - For goodness sakes, please, unless you're doing a parody of e e cummings, capitalize your "I"s!
Denise-Marie -- The "I"s have it -- so noted and added.