And The Winner Is!

Last week, I wrote about how my one of my entries into a local contest made the final cut of fifteen great opening lines from over 500 entries. I had entered three options, and this is the one that became a finalist: 

She needed some legal advice, or a husband, and fast.  

My entry didn't win, or even come in the silver or bronze position. Rather, it was one of the twelve others who were judged the cream of the crop. I'm thrilled to have made it to the final cut, because the competition was heady and fierce. And I agreed with the judges on the winning entry, submitted by a gentleman from Columbus, OH. Here it is: 

The kindergarten teacher told us that one baby in four was born Chinese, and being the fourth child in the family I naturally figured I was Chinese and needed to learn the language.

Very tongue-in-cheeky and made me laugh. You can't ask for more than that from an opening line. 

How about you? Do you agree with the judges?

 

Contest Season

A lot of people ask me why I still enter writing contests. After all, I've published 19 books, and written plenty more that will never come out from under the bed. Am I a glutton for punishment or what?

It takes a great amount of courage to enter a contest.After all, you're asking for people to tear into the story you've poured yourself into for months and find things wrong with it.  I'm not a trophy collector and don't really care if I win. But I would like to be a finalist, since that means my work gets read by someone in the industry. However, even if I don't make it into the top three, I can count on getting some really helpful feedback about my entry. That's the real reason I enter contests. Since I moved to North Carolina, I lost my critique group. And it doesn't matter how many books you've written, another set of eyes on your work is always a good idea. Often the author is too close to the work, knows exactly what the story is about, even though it hasn't translated entirely to the page.


Such is the case with my current WIP. The idea sprouted from a scene in another book I was working on and I decided to run with it. But, while I was running, I kept one of the characters from the original manuscript and he kind of was like the headless horseman in this instance. I didn't really think about him in this manuscript, since it worked in the other book, but the contest judges were left scratching their heads. Needless to say, the man is gone now. He hit the cutting room floor with a resounding thud.

I've taken the comments from the first contest and improved the opening scenes of the book. And I have even more ideas on how to improve it further. Since a book is never done, even after it's published, I'll keep working on this one.

Watch this space.

More Than Bragging Rights

In the romance community, contest season is in full swing.

A lot of the RWA chapters like to tie their event to the big national conference, which takes place each year in July. I recently acted as a category coordinator for the Northeast Ohio chapter's contest, and judged some entries in the historical category, which is my wheelhouse.

The reason I give back to the romance writing community in this way is because of the great feedback I got, and still get, from entering contests and letting total strangers read my work. When I'm judging an entry, I point out the strengths of each author and pick a few things they need help with. It's the way I like to get feedback and I hope my suggestions are taken in the manner they're intended and the author strengthens her work as a result.

Being a category coordinator is a slightly different animal. I assigned judges for the various entries and checked the scoresheets when they were returned. I was looking for solid comments that could help the writer without demoralizing them. We've all heard stories about how so much negative feedback made people give up on writing altogether, and I didn't want anything like that to happen on my watch.

In addition to participating in this way, I still enter contests, even with 19 books under my belt. I appreciate the feedback from these strangers and usually find some nuggets I can use to enhance my work. My most recent entry was for a work-in-progress, entered into the Romance Through The Ages contest. After I entered the work, I realized my point of view character should be the hero rather than the heroine, since his part in the story is what makes the story different from other mail order bride books. I've changed the title and have been working on this manuscript ever since, changing it around, but the entry stood in the first version.

So what happened? I placed third in my category--Colonial/Civil War. But my hero, Jake, was nominated for the Legend award, for the hero most likely to become legendary, and he won!

So, even with no real feedback in the form of a scoresheet yet, I already have proof that Jake needs more screen time and the beginning of the story needs work. Revisions are next up on my queue, right after I get my Regency heroine out of the mess she's created for herself.

But, since bragging rights are part of the contest frenzy, here are my badges to show the results of the most recent contest. Huzzah!

And as some have already guessed, the hero, Jake Shelton, first appeared in one of the Cotillion books, Banking On Temperance. He was the one spurned when Temperance finally admitted her love for Basil Fitzpatrick. And, yes, my muse for him was Blake Shelton, while he was still married to Miranda Lambert. I'll never forgive him for his defection to Gwen Stefani, but obviously, as the recipient of the Legend award, his actions, both when Temperance spurned him, and now, in the WIP, are the stuff of legends.

Contest Season

Every year, I look forward to getting my books for the RITA contest. This year, I got seven, which I had to read and judge in the space of six weeks. I added on a few more contests this year, judging the Prism contest because I wanted to see how historical paranormal was handled. I had to read three books for that one. And now, the contemporary chapter of RWA has reintroduced the Stiletto contest and I just yesterday received two more published novels to read and one unpublished entry.

Our own NEORWA chapter has a contest for unpublished authors going on as well, and I had to judge three entries there.

Even though it's a huge time commitment, I see this as my way to pay back the industry. I got a lot of help, and still am getting it, on my road to publication, and contests were the way I received valuable feedback to make my works stronger. And this way, if I'm lucky, I might find a new-to-me author in the bunch, find a book I would never have picked up otherwise.

 I think I went a bit overboard this year. I understand all these contests want to gear their announcements of winners during the RWA conference, but I really wish someone would hold a contest in the fall. It would even out my reading enjoyment.

Now, back to work. I still have two books to go before I can get back to my book-in-progress, not to mention my work-in-progress!

Back To The Drawing Board

Like most authors, I'm constantly searching for new ways to approach my craft. I take online and in person workshops, read articles on how to show vs. tell, enter contests for published authors showcasing their new work. Since I have been published for four years, some folks think I don't need to do this anymore since I must know it all by now.

If only it were that simple.

I had an idea for a contemporary two years ago, which was to be part of a trilogy. I wrote the manuscript, found an agent to peddle it for me, had it sent out all over the place, and got no bites. I fired the agent, took a look at the editing notes the agent only gave me after the first round of rejections, and revised the manuscript. I then sent if off myself to another publishing house with whom I've had some dealings in the past. Their acquisitions person got back to me saying she'd love to work with me, liked my work, but wanted me to change the beginning, middle and end. I told her I'd get back to her, and promptly filed the manuscript away for a rainy day.

It's not raining, but we did have a freakish snow storm here in Ohio over the weekend, so I thought it was a perfect time to pull it out and take another look at it. After reading the first twenty pages, I realized I hadn't run the document through my checklist, since some of my taboo words showed up with an uneasy frequency. Maybe the acquisitions editor wasn't so far off the mark after all.

I still think I'll send it elsewhere when I deem it ready to go again. And I'm not writing books two and three in this trilogy until the first one finds a home.

Contest Caution

It's that time of year again. Contests abound for romance writers.

So far this year (and remember, it's only February), I've judged the RITA entries I was assigned to, judged the entries in my local chapter's contest for unpublished authors, and am waiting for the entries in the Hearts Through History contest for unpublished authors.

Why do I so willingly give of my time to judge contests? The answer is very simple. The feedback I got from contests helped me become a published author, and I want to return the favor. Besides, with the RITA entries, you have no choice. If you enter a book into that contest, you must read some entries. It's a huge contest, with 2,000 entries, all needing five judges each. Imagine the logistics nightmare the RWA staff has each January.

Contests are not the only place where you can get feedback. Any number of workshops are offered each week, geared to improving some aspect or the other of your work. Feedback from these workshops can also be invaluable. With my most recent historical, currently still a WIP, someone caught the fact I was leaving the cow in the pasture overnight. Obviously the woman had more farming knowledge than I did, since she flagged it for my attention. A quick check with my 80-year-old uncle verified the woman's claim. Something as precious as a cow would have been brought in from the pasture each night and put in the barn, away from predators. My entire story had to change, but without that input, I'd have been laughed out of every farming community in the country.

But I have to throw out a note of caution in both instances. Chances are the person reading your work doesn't write in your particular genre, and if that's the case, their remarks should not be considered gospel. Their overall impression of your work–fine–but individual remarks? Not so much. I recently had a case where the work I was judging was set in ancient Scotland. I know nothing about the era, other than what I see on the Outlander series, so some of the words tripped me up. I had to put in my notes to the author that I was unschooled in her particular genre, so she should only consider my overall impression of her work. And then, someone who was remarking on my work–a historical set in 1860s America–referred to a medical condition that has only been diagnosed in the past twenty years. Again, I fact-checked my work and found that, in this case, anyway, I was correct.

The moral of this story is this–your work needs to be viewed by someone other than your family and friends, in order to get constructive criticism, and contests and workshops are a very good way to accomplish this. But not everyone who offers feedback is competent to do so.

A grain of salt needs to be added in each time a person gets a contest entry back with comments. But you should enter your work, and get back comments. It will only improve your writing.