The Rejection Diaries

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Bath Novel Award, Fiona Mitchell

The Bath Novel judges have started releasing ‘teasers’ for their short list – and many, like myself, will doubtless be desperately persuading ourselves that our plots somehow resemble those described below. Try as I might, however, it can’t be done. Another competition entry bites the dust…

There is, however, much to be learned. My book isn’t actually bad (it’s been long listed in one competition and came third in another), but clearly it isn’t good enough. My opening page in particular lacks the impact to stand out against competition like this: 

• ‘Stranded time-traveller misfit goes on the run.’
• ‘Two families bound together in the aftermath of tragedy.’
• ‘Young care leavers are re-homed in a remote Cornish resort.’
• ‘Spare and tenderly written story of siblings reunited in rural Ireland.’
• ‘Tightly written tale of a divided community. Interesting, vivid characters with exceptional sense of place.’
• ‘A summer fling, an affair and an unexplained death during a family holiday.’

There is a pattern here: strong and well-written characters combined with drama and a vivid sense of place. Something that reaches out from the page and grabs the reader.

I wish the writers of the above books every success and am enjoying a frisson of vicarious pleasure at imaging how they must feel at the moment. Well done to every one of them.

A member of ninevoices recently drew our attention to an excellent post by Fiona Mitchell on what can be learned from rejection. She wrote amusingly of her ‘Folder of Doom‘, containing a sheaf of rejections, but listed five positive things that she’d learned from them. Well worth studying. So I’m not about to make a drama out of not getting on this short list. Nobody died. Nobody took out a big pointy sword and threatened me with it. I simply need to give my opening a bit (maybe even a lot) more welly and keep my sense of humour handy. And there are plenty of other competitions out there.

 

Check out Fiona Mitchell’s encouraging piece here: https://fionamitchell.org/2018/05/09/5-types-of-rejection-letters-and-what-you-can-learn-from-them/

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Competitions to Enter in April

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Bath Novel Award, Binstead Arts Poetry Competition, Bristol Short Story Prize, The Pin Drop Short Story Award 2018, Ver Poets Open Competition

 

 

It’s SPRING, guys. Time for new beginnings. New short stories, new novels, new flash fiction, new poetry. You promised yourself you would write more, remember?

Dark Tales Horror & Speculative Fiction Competition for a short story, maximum 5,000 words. Prize: £100, plus publication. Entry fee: £2.50 (subscribers), or £4 (non-subscribers). Deadline 30 April. Details http://www.darktales.co.uk/contest.php

Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Competition 2018 are inviting 2,500 word entries on the subject of ‘The Looking Glass’. The winner will have the opportunity of publication in Harper’s Bazaar and will receive a two-night stay and three-course dinner for two at Amberley Castle Hotel in Suffolk, plus a selection of gifts from Smythson. There is NO entry fee, but entries must be original and unpublished. Deadline is 9 April Details: http://writ.rs/harpersbazaarstorycomp2018

For its 2018 annual creative writing competition, Brentwood Writers’ Circle has taken the theme of Room 101. Entrants are invited to think of something they hate that should be consigned to Room 101 and write about it in exactly 101 words. Prize momey totals £101: £51 for the winner; £30 for second and £20 for third. Entry is £3 and the closing date is 30 April. Details: http://www.brentwoodwriterscircle.org

Binstead Arts Poetry Competition. Poem: 40 lines max. Theme ‘country’. Prizes: £150; £100; £50, plus an invitation to read poems at the Binstead Arts Festival. Entry: £5, first poem, £3.50 thereafter. Deadline 9 April. Details: http://www.binsted.org/poetry-comp-18.

Bath Novel Award for your first 5,000 words and a synopsis. Prizes: £2,500; manuscript feedback and agent literary introductions; Cornerstones Literary Consultancy online editing course. Entry fee: £25. Deadline: 30 April. Details: http://www.bathnovelaward.co.uk

Ver Poets Open Competition for a 30 line poem. Entrants must be over 16. Prizes:£600; £300; £100, plus publication and invitation to read winning poems at poetry afternoon. Entry Fee: £4; £10 for three. Deadline 30 April. Details: https://verpoets.co.uk/poetry-competitions

Bristol Short Story Prize. Story: max. 4,000 words. Prizes: £1,000; £700; £400, plus 17x£100. Entry fee £8. Deadline: 1 May Details: http://www.bristolprize.co.uk

The Pin Drop Short Story Award 2018 is inviting entries of original, unpublished stories up to 4,000 words for its annual award, staged by Pin Drop in association with the Royal Academy of Arts. The winner will receive £500 with the winning story narrated live by an actor at a special event at the Royal Academy. The event will be recorded for Pin Drop’s podcast series.Entry is FREE and the deadline is 15 April. Details from http://www.pindropsudio.com

Please check the websites for full details, and remember that Writing Magazine and Writers’ Forum also have competitions, many of which are open to non-subscribers.

Keep Your Novel Away from the Slush Pile

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Bath Novel Award, Bridport Novel, Competitions, debut novels, Myriad First Crimes

Love someone to snap up your debut novel – but hate the prospect of it moldering at the bottom of that notorious agent slush pile?

Why not sidestep this process by entering one of the competitions below? Yes, there will still be a biggish number of entrants, but the organisers of these sound a tad less jaded than the hard-pressed folk in the literary agencies.

Bath Novel Award. 5,000 opening words, plus a synopsis. Those shortlisted will be expected to have at least 50,000 words available before the end of April. The winner gets a £2,000 prize plus a consultancy report from Cornerstones. One runner up will also receive a consultancy report. Entry fee is £22. Deadline: 10 April.  Details from bathnovelaward.co.uk

Yeovil First Novel Prize. 15,000 words, including a synopsis. Couldn’t find details of the prize on their site – you may be more successful in doing so! There will be something worth having, plus, of course, La Gloire. Entry fee is £11. Details from http://www.yeovilprize.co.uk

Good Housekeeping New Novel Award. (see our own post on this of 7 January) They are offering a book deal and a £10,000 advance. They’re asking for a full synopsis – two pages – plus the first 5,000 words and a 100 word biography. Deadline 31 March. BUT entry is only via a coupon in the February edition of Good Housekeeping.

Bridport First Novel Prize (Peggy Chapman Andrews Award).  5000-8000 words, plus 300-word synopsis. First prize £1,000 plus mentoring with The Literary Consultancy. Second Prize £500, plus manuscript assessed by TLC. Three runners up receive £100, plus a 50-page ms. assessment report. Entry fee £20. Details http://www.bridportprize.org.uk  Deadline 31 May.

First Novel Prize organised by literary consultancy Daniel Goldsmith Associates. Prizes: £1,000, £250, £100. They want fiction manuscripts of over 50,000-words, synopsis to be included in the same document. Entry fee: £25. Can’t see deadline date, but check details at: firstnovel.co.uk

Debut Dagger Competition. Prize: £500 plus submission to agents and editors. Entry fee £30 plus VAT. Deadline 28 February. Details http://cwdaggers.co.uk/debut

See also our own post on Myriad First Crimes competition, posted on 29 December. The prize is mentoring for a crime novel.

PLEASE PLEASE check all details on the relevant website. Like the curate’s egg, this list is good in part, dodgy in others. And good luck!