Literary Storm Novel Contest- SPECIAL DEADLINE EXTENSION: Feb 26, 2010!

WordHustler’s Literary Storm Novel Contest- FINAL DEADLINE EXTENDED!

WordHustler is taking our writing contests to a whole new level with the debut of our Literary Storm Novel Contest (ENTER HERE). Submit the first 50 pages of your novel and you could win BIG! The details:

Official Judge: Literary Agent Danielle Chiotti of Upstart Crow Literary

Grand Prize: A Complete Manuscript Critique by Joyce Sweeney, who has helped 27 people get published! (Psst: this prize is worth over $500!) as well as publication consideration from brilliant indie press Flatmancrooked!

Second and Third Prizes: Barnes and Noble Gift Certificates

NEW BONUS PRIZE:  The Top Ten Entries will ALL be considered for publishing by Flatmancrooked!

FINAL Deadline: February 26th, 2010

Entry Fee: $15 ($10 if submitted BEFORE January 27th, 2010)

What to Submit: The first 50 pages of your finished novel, along with a cover letter. Manuscript critiques are also available for an additional fee of $25 ($20 if submitted BEFORE Jan. 27th, 2010). All genres of novels are accepted, including Middle Grade and Young Adult.

Go to the WordHustler Literary Storm Contest listing RIGHT HERE to enter or hit the button below to sign in (or sign up) and enter!

About Our Prizes: 

From the Upstart Crow Literary website: We believe good books matter far too much to be taken lightly, and that the careers of those books’ creators are a very serious business. That quality of long-term nurturing and author advocacy is something all of us here aim for: We work with our clients to polish their manuscripts, hone their voices, and find the best match of editor and publishing house. And then we look to what comes after that first or third or sixth book: Our authors are our partners, talents we intend to work with over long, illustrious careers.

From the Flatmancrooked site: Flatmancrooked is a semi-traditional small press that prides itself on producing beautiful books and reimagining the way those books are marketed. We tout books as art objects, and feel that first runs should be precious, limited editions. Selling massive numbers of copies of a soft-cover isn’t the future of 21st Century publishing. But printing a few hundred, gorgeous, collectible copies, and giving away a digital version free, is.

From Joyce Sweeney’s site: Fifteen years ago I started teaching writing classes and found my true calling. Even more than writing itself, I love helping and mentoring writers. I moved from five week classes to an ongoing workshop in Fort Lauderdale, where I could work with writers for as long as it took - sometimes years - to get that first book into print.

My one workshop expanded to two, and I started working with manuscripts from writers all over the country, critiquing, advising, sometimes just pulling out the old pep talk. I’m now so proud to say that 27 of the people I’ve worked with have become published authors.

Finalists and Winners will be announced by March 15th, 2010 and their names posted on WordHustlerInk. See below for Official Rules and Regulations. Good Luck, Hustlers!

*Please Note: The Top Ten finalists will be determined by the WH team and then judged by Danielle Chiotti. We are looking for compelling writing that is original, daring, and worthy of being published. The WH team consists of 10 writers with a combined experience of over 80 years in the industry.

Official Contest Rules, aka the nitty-gritty:

1. Please submit work through WordHustler’s system by going to the contest listing HERE and using WordHustler’s submission system. Upload your novel (in its entirety or the first 5o pages) into your Hustlefolio and go to the WordHustler Literary Storm Novel Contest listing. Press “Submit Work” and you will be walked through the Submission Wizard. 

2. Submit the first FIFTY pages ONLY. No exceptions. If you have uploaded your entire manuscript to your Hustlefolio, be sure in Step 2 of the submission wizard, when you select the project and are asked “How Many Pages Do You Want to Send?” - select the “Other” bubble and then type in 50.

3. Manuscript critiques are an ADDITIONAL $25 per project, which includes detailed notes emailed to you. Turnaround time is usually a month, depending on the volume of the submissions at the time. Also, getting your manuscript critiqued does not necessarily guarantee placement in the contest. If you get your notes back and decide you’d like to take some of them into account and resubmit, you must resubmit anew, i.e. with a new entry fee, and get it in before the final deadline.

4. The entry fee for the contest (to cover the readers, judging, and prizes) is $15. Sending physical manuscripts through our system, where we print and ship them for you, costs different amounts depending on the page count. Since the contest requires 50 pages, the cost is $8.99. This covers the physical printing and shipping of your manuscript to our judges, as well as a SASE for the results. You can find additional info on our prices on our FAQ HERE.

5. Submission Deadline is 2/26/10 at 12:00pm PST. Submissions received after that time will not be read.

6. Ten Finalists will be chosen by WordHustler’s judging committee. Of those Final Ten, the top three will be chosen by Danielle Chiotti of Upstart Crow Literary.

7. Being a Top Ten Finalist, or placing First, Second, or Third, automatically guarantees the editorial staff of Flatmancrooked will read and consider publishing your novel. It does NOT mean they will publish it, it means they will REVIEW it and if interested, contact you about publishing it.

8. Winners and finalists will be contacted and announced on WordHustlerInk by March 15th, 2010.

9. WordHustler reserves the right to disqualify any member who breaks contest rules.

10. You can enter as many novels as you’d like, with a $15 Entry Fee for each.

11. WordHustler will NOT make any of the winners’ or finalists’ pages public, as we want the entrants to be able to publish their novels, since that is the goal of the contest. Since a literary agent is judging and a free (and valuable) manuscript critique is the prize, we don’t want to put any pages up on the internet, which would constitute “publishing” to some. Winners’ names and titles of their work, however, will be made public. Pen names can be used, as long as legitimate emails and phone numbers are provided.

12. Must be 18 years or older to enter. All WordHustler Terms and Conditions apply.

If you have any questions, email Contests@WordHustler.com and we’ll be happy to answer them. Or check Section 34 in WordHustler’s Terms & Conditions for more contest info. Good luck!!!