“The Writer’s Voice” is a multi-blog, multi-agent contest hosted by Cupid of Cupid’s Literary Connection, Monica B.W. of Love YA, Krista Van Dolzer of Mother. Write. (Repeat.), and ME. We’re basing it on NBC’s singing reality show The Voice, so the four of us will serve as coaches and select projects for our teams based on their queries and first pages.
Here’s the timeline:
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May 3
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Everyone submits their entries
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May 3-10
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We select our team members from “The Writer’s Voice” Blogfest
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May 10-17
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We coach our team members, helping them polish their entries
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May 17
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We post our team members’ entries on our blogs
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May 21
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Agents vote for their favorites
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Submissions
To enter, your manuscript must meet two conditions: First, it must be COMPLETE, POLISHED, AND READY TO QUERY, and second, it must be in one of the following genres:
Adult Fantasy
Adult Science Fiction
Adult Romance
YA fiction (all subgenres)
MG fiction (all subgenres)
We’ll accept entries in two time slots. The first submission window will open at 9:00 a.m. EDT on Thursday, May 3, and will close once we receive 75 entries. The second submission window will open at 9:00 p.m. EDT on the same day and will close once we receive another 75 entries.
We’ll accept submissions via one of Mister Linky’s Magical Widgets, which we’ll post on all four of our blogs on May 3. Once you sign up for the blogfest, you’ll post YOUR QUERY and THE FIRST 250 WORDS of your manuscript on your blog. Then you’ll send your query, first 250 words, and A LINK TO YOUR BLOG POST in the body of an e-mail to TheWritersVoiceContest(at)gmail(dot)com, with your blogfest (linky) number, title, and genre in the subject line.
In summary, you must follow these three steps to enter:
1. Sign up for the blogfest during one of the submission windows listed above.
2. Post your query and the first 250 words of your manuscript on your blog.
3. Send your query, first 250 words, and a link to your blog post to TheWritersVoiceContest(at)gmail(dot)com, with your blogfest number, title, and genre in the subject line.
Selections
We’re building our teams via “The Writer’s Voice” Blogfest, so YOU MUST HAVE A BLOG TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS CONTEST. We don’t care if you’ve had it for five years or five minutes; we just want to be able to fight over you in public:)
We coaches will review the entries by e-mail, but when we find one we want, we’ll leave a comment on your post that says something like, “I want you!” If more than one of us wants you on her team, you’ll have to pick which coach you want to work with.
Coaching
We’ll select our 10 team members by May 10, then spend the next week helping them put a final polish on their entries. You won’t have to take all of our suggestions, of course; we just want to help you make your entry the best that it can be before the agents get a look at it.
Voting
On May 17, we’ll post our team members’ queries and first pages on our blogs so that the agents can review them. Here are the 8 awesome agents who’ll be voting on your entries:
The agents will vote for their favorites on May 21. Each vote will count as a partial or full request depending on how many votes the entry receives. If an entry receives 1 or 2 votes, those votes will count as partial requests. If an entry receives 3 or more votes, those votes will count as full requests.
Voting will stay open for twenty-four hours, at which point we’ll determine which coach’s team received the most votes. That coach will win bragging rights for time immemorial, and everyone who received requests will be able to submit their materials to all the agents who voted for them.
So get those queries and first pages polished up, then meet us back here on Thursday, May 3, at either 9:00 a.m. or 9:00 p.m. EDT. We can’t wait to read your entries! (And of course, if you have any questions, feel free to ask them in the comments below.)
31 Comments
Jessa Russo (Stadtler) · April 17, 2012 at 7:21 am
YES! This sounds wonderful! So glad my girlfriend told me about it! Thank you ladies for doing this for everyone!
A.J. Locke · April 17, 2012 at 7:25 am
This sounds like fun, thanks for putting it together! For Adult Fantasy, does that include sub-genres?
Rebecca Enzor · April 17, 2012 at 7:27 am
What an excellent contest! It does sound fun 🙂 I’ll definitely be here on May 3rd trying to get a spot!
A.M. Swan · April 17, 2012 at 7:45 am
Yes this does sound interesting, but – similar to A.J. – does Adult Fantasy include paranormal?
Brenda Drake · April 17, 2012 at 7:56 am
AJ and AM – Yes and yes. Good luck!
LateToTheParty · April 17, 2012 at 8:27 am
You’re a nice lady, Ms. Drake. Buona fortuna to all.
Jenny S. Morris · April 17, 2012 at 8:33 am
Wow, this sounds amazing! You guys really are awesome. ;0)
Stephsco · April 17, 2012 at 9:32 am
As always, I’ll be lurking in the shadows, gleaning any information I can from you brave souls ready to submit your work 🙂
Veronica Bartles · April 17, 2012 at 10:43 am
I’m so excited! I can’t wait!! 🙂
Krysten Hill · April 17, 2012 at 11:41 am
I’m TOTALLY going to enter this contest! Good thing I had already polished my first 250 words!
Bit my query…oh god.
Carrie-Anne · April 17, 2012 at 12:08 pm
I hope my YA historical will be done by then so I can participate! I’ve been making excellent time on expanding a very long short story into a full novel, and it seems like it’ll be done within the next few weeks.
Jamie Corrigan · April 17, 2012 at 5:52 pm
Oh! This looks like it’s going to be way more fun than I originally thought! I’m working really hard on getting my ms fully polished by the 3rd! Thanks again for doing this. B, you guys rock! *hugs* 🙂
SueJay · April 17, 2012 at 6:48 pm
Wow this sounds super fun! I can’t wait.
Kimberly · April 17, 2012 at 9:10 pm
Wow. Another awesome contest. I’ve been reworking my first 250 since the last one you had. 🙂
Thank you so much for all the opportunities! You all rock!
Donna Hole · April 17, 2012 at 9:45 pm
I have the perfect story to polish up. And I’m posting this on my blog on Thursday.
Is there a specific ms length (word count)? Mine is more along the lines of a long short story (about 20k words).
……….dhole
Kelley Lynn · April 18, 2012 at 6:38 am
So PUMPED! Thanks so much for doing this!
Brenda Drake · April 18, 2012 at 8:01 am
I’m pumped too! Can’t wait to read your pages. I’m a little terrified about the coach competition, but I think it’ll be grand! <3
Amber · April 18, 2012 at 10:55 am
Who-hoo, I am super excited. I have re-written my query a gazillion times, but I think I’ve got it where I want it 🙂 My first 250 as well.
I do have a question…I noticed on cupid’s post, they said when the four of you pick your choices, the entries reposted would be pages…or did I mis-read that?
Basically- will the final post with the top 40 still be the query and first 250?
And did I say thanks? Thanks so much for putting this together!!
R.A.Desilets · April 18, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Oh my goodness, Brenda!
I’m coming back from my honeymoon literally TWO HOURS before the second window opens – Thank you for keeping me in mind 😉
In all seriousness, I am super excited, and I am going to prep all my stuff ahead of time so I don’t have to worry about it when the time comes.
Thanks bunches for everyone that works on these 🙂 You gals rock!
Brenda Drake · April 18, 2012 at 4:14 pm
Thanks everyone! I’m glad you’re excited!
R.A. – Congrats on the impending wedding! That’s crazy timing. I hope you make it back. 😀
Ashley Nixon · April 19, 2012 at 10:19 am
This is such a wonderful opportunity. I just finished editing my book for the 100203848758569 time, but I’d like to have CP critiques back first…so I’m a little frightened by this! I guess you never know what would happen if you don’t try!
Gina Gao · April 20, 2012 at 7:40 am
This sounds like such a great opportunity. I’m really looking forward to joining it.
http://www.modernworld4.blogspot.com
R.A.Desilets · April 20, 2012 at 7:27 pm
@ Brenda – heh, we’ve been married for nine months 😉 So it’s just a belated honeymoon. But I’m still stoked!
Anita Saxena · April 22, 2012 at 11:55 am
This sounds like a lot of fun. Thank you for putting it together.
Heather Webb · April 23, 2012 at 10:53 am
I love this! I wish you ran contests for hisfic and women’s fic writers. Hope you have a great turn out!
Madeleine Maddocks · April 23, 2012 at 12:27 pm
This sounds awesome! It’s a shame my WIP is only a third completed, though I have had a small epiphany with it and plan to finish it someday when other pressures have subsided.
Matthew MacNish · April 27, 2012 at 10:33 am
I can definitely get into this, so I’m following. Nice to meet you, Brenda!
Hopeful Author · April 30, 2012 at 1:10 pm
Question: what do you mean by “blogfest (linky) number”? Is the blogfest what’s happening here, or is the blogfest something else we also have to sign up for?
Robin Weeks · April 30, 2012 at 8:19 pm
How much of the query do you want? Just the blurb or the bio and comparative stuff, too? If the 250 ends in the middle of a sentence, would you rather we go over or under?
And I hope you realize that May 3rd is the first day of a writer’s conference I’m attending. I’m getting up extra early just so I have time to play. 🙂
Love your contests!
Brenda Drake · May 1, 2012 at 5:27 am
Hey all, it’s getting near – I’m so excited!
Hopeful – We’ll have a sign up linky for you to sign up on May 3 – afterward you post your entry to your blog and email your entry to the contest email – we go to your site and tell you if we want you – if you get 2 coaches you pick who you want.
Robin – Just the meat of the query (no credentials) and yes, please go to the end of that sentence if the 250 falls in the middle.
Good luck everyone!
Randy · May 2, 2012 at 5:19 pm
This is a really great contest. Unfortunately, I will be traveling to the LDStoryMakers conferrence during the submission times.
Oh well. Maybe next time. I’d love to have a couple agents take a look at my story.
Good luck everyone.
Comments are closed.