From September 21-26, we’re posting mini-interviews with most of the 2020 Pitch Wars mentors. We thought it would be fun to have them answer one question. A question that would give you an idea of their likes and personalities. And possibly point out a mentor you may have missed on your exhaustive search for which mentors you’ll submit to when our submission window opens. Don’t know what Pitch Wars is START HERE.
Giveaway!
We’re giving away 2020 mentors’ and committee members’ books! Go to the bottom of this post for details and to enter for a chance to win.
Need to connect to the community?
Join the Pitch Wars forum to have discussions with some of our mentors and other writers or get your work critiqued by your peers and sometimes mentors or search for critique partners. It’s our gift to you for being so awesome, and we hope you find this space useful. To join the forum go here: http://pitchwars.proboards.com/
Mark your calendars!
Join us for our official #PitchWars #askmentor chats on Twitter and our live mentor video chats happening on Sarah Nicolas’ Youtube channel. Go to this blog post for dates and follow @PitchWars on Twitter for all the details.
This is the question we asked our mentors to answer: Invite three authors (living or dead) to dinner – who and why?
And here are their answers …
“George Eliot—how did she write such fantastic historical fiction without the internet? Frederick Douglass because he has one of the most wonderful written voices I’ve ever read and I’d like to hear what his actual voice sounds like reading his beautiful words. Octavia Butler because I want to know how she predicted the mess we’re in now when she wrote PARABLE OF THE SOWER.”
Samantha Rajaram
“L.A. Banks because she wrote the kickass Vampire Huntress Legend series which has sexy, suave Master Vampire Carlos Rivera who has all the swag as a love interest, and really I just need to know WHO was the inspiration for my Mr. Councilman because GAH! WHERE CAN I FIND HIM?!!! Ilona Andrews so I can talk about all things Kate Daniels and Curran Lennart. N.K Jemisin because she is brilliant, her stories, world building and character work is beyond smart, and I would commit murder for the chance to soak up some of her wisdom.”
N. E. Davenport
“I’d invite Ursula K. LeGuin, one of my first inspirations as an SFF writer. I was lucky enough to meet her once after a reading and get a book signed, but there are so many conversations I’d still love to have with her. I’d invite the author of the Voynich Manuscript, because I really want to see who they were and find out what’s up with that weird book! And finally, if a not-yet-living writer counts, I’d invite a debut speculative fiction author from the year 2100 to see what’s going on in the genre (& ask them what all the alternate-history fiction about 2020 is like!)”
Ren Hutchings
Denise says, “Kennedy Ryan – Talking on the phone with her was the, hands down, highlight of my quarantine.”
Denise Williams
and co-mentor
Charish says, “Arnold Adoff who wrote Black is Brown is Tan which was the first book I ever read as a kid that talked about being biracial. #3. My co-mentor Charish Reid because we’ve never actually met in person and I want to share a meal with her!“
Charish Reid
Enter for a chance to win one of our mentors’ or committee members’ books. We’ll choose ten winners to receive one book each. All you have to do is search our mentors’ and committee members’ books, pick one you’d like to receive should you win, and enter it in the rafflcopter at the bottom of this post. The book must be one from our 2020 mentors or committee members.
You can find our mentor pages here: https://pitchwars.org/mentor-status/active/ And you can find our committee members here: https://pitchwars.org/about/meet-the-pitch-wars-committee/
It’s open internationally, but only for books available on the Book Depository. Make sure to go to their site and verify the book is listed for sale before choosing your book in the Rafflecopter.