Secret Agent Contest At Miss. Snark's First Victim Blog

Miss Snark's First Victim blog is running a Secret Agent: Are You Hooked? Contest for the following genres:

• Young adult fiction (all genres)
• Middle grade fiction (all genres)
• Science Fiction/Fantasy
• Paranormal Romance (NO other romance; only paranormal)

The contest is for completed manuscripts only. See below for rules and guidelines or visit Miss. Snark's First Victim blog.

*(snipped the following from the blog) Submissions for the next Secret Agent contest will open at noon EDT on Monday, September 7. Submissions WILL NOT OPEN until NOON, EDT on Monday, September 7. Early submissions WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED. Submissions are for COMPLETED MANUSCRIPTS ONLY. If you wouldn't want an agent to read the entire thing, DON'T SEND IT. If an "entire thing" doesn't exist, you shouldn't even be reading these rules. Manuscripts THAT HAVE ALREADY BEEN IN ANY SECRET AGENT CONTEST THIS YEAR will not be accepted. You may submit A DIFFERENT MANUSCRIPT if you've participated in any of the 2009 Secret Agent contests. If you are PAST WINNER, please DO NOT ENTER THIS CONTEST. Submissions are for THE FIRST 250 WORDS of your manuscript. Your submission for this contest should be formatted as follows: SCREEN NAME TITLE GENRE (Followed by the excerpt here.)

• No "chapter one," chapter titles, etc.
• You will receive a confirmation email with your post number. I don't always get through quickly. Don't resend.
• Submissions go to facelesswords(at)gmail.com. They DO NOT GO to my authoressmail address. Those of you who are subscribed to this blog via email will note the latter address as the "from." If you use this address for the contest, I WILL NOT SEE YOUR SUBMISSION.
• Erm, I think that's everything.

This month's contest will include the following genres:

• Young adult fiction (all genres)
• Middle grade fiction (all genres)
• Science Fiction/Fantasy
• Paranormal Romance (NO other romance; only paranormal)

Questions? Leave them in the comment box of this post. For those of you who have never heard of this contest, basically this is how it works. (Snipped from the blog)

There will be a call for submissions. When the call comes, follow the guidelines carefully and submit your excerpt before the deadline. All submissions will then be posted (anonymously) on the blog, and all readers are invited to leave critiques/feedback. Everyone who has entered the contest is expected to crit a minimum of five entries -- it's the mutual backscratch thing.

Our Secret Agent will join the panel of critters (that is, you) and will leave feedback for every entry. When the contest has ended, the Secret Agent will choose a winner or winners. That's it in a nutshell!

Check the side bar on the blog for a list of Agents who have participated in the past. One of the good things about this contest is, it's a great way to get your MS in front of an Agent. Even if you don't win you could receive a request for your ms. So get that manuscript polished! To learn more about this contest, visit the Secret Agent Contest Info Page. Happy Writing!

Free Query Letter Critique At Dorchester Publishing

To celebrate the launch of the new Dorchester Writer’s Corner (where you'll find advice for aspiring writers), Dorchester editors will chose and critique five query letter's from those posted in their new Writer's Forum. All genre's are welcome to submit (romance, horror, thrillers, and Westerns). Deadline is September 1, 2009, so hurry and polish that query letter! Visit the Dorchester message board to learn more. Dorchester Publishing Dorchester Forums Dorchester Writer's Corner

Free Workshop At Rose Colored Glasses August 9th - August 15th

Here's some workshop info I thought I'd pass this on. Enjoy! FREE Workshop!August 9-15, 2009 Join the Roses at Rose’s Colored Glasses for week-long workshop where we'll help you discover the more productive writer lurking inside you! Here's what you'll learn: 1. What do you want? 2. What's Stopping You? 3. Pre-writing Planning 4. Cranking out the Pages 5. Tools for Goal setting and Planning To join, send an email to RosesWriteFiftyBooks-subscribe@yahoogroups.com or sign up from here. It's free, it's interactive and fun! Rose Colored Glasses Website

Agent Articles and Resources

There seems to be a lot of really good info floating around the agent blogs this past week. Check out these tidbits, if you're interested. The Guide to Literary Agents share's an excerpt from an article in the yet-to-be released 2010 Guide to Literary Agents by Agent Mollie Glick of the Foundry Literary + Media Agency, entitled Write a Killer Query Letter: How to Hook an Agent. Also on THE GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS is a post by Dorchester editor Leah Hultenschmidt entitled 12 Points of Contracts. Dystel & Goderich talk about the etiquette of submitting to an Agent. Agent in the middle says E.K., a junior agent at the L. Perkins Agency, is aggressively seeking Middle Grade and YA submissions. Check out what E.K.'s looking for here. On Bookends, Jessica Faust discusses Submissions 101. The post is basically a step by step process about submitting to an agent, and starts with making sure your book is written, edited, rewritten and polished before even thinking of sending off a query letter. Great info. And last but not least, agent Nathan Bransford wants to know how you deal with the "am-I-crazies?" Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Call For Submissions

I thought some of you might be interested in the following submissions call. Good luck! PILL HILL PRESS ANTHOLOGY Open to all mainstream genres (including action/adventure, cross genre, slipstream, experimental, fantasy, historical, horror, literary, mystery, romance, science fiction, suspense/crime, western) as long as it fits within the theme of the anthology. Looking for horror/suspense/mystery/supernatural stories that take place in rural America. Especially interested in stories that take place in Nebraska or surrounding states, though any rural location is acceptable and will be considered. Fiction Length: 500 word minimum, 7,500 word maximum. Pays 1 cent/word plus 1 contributor's copy upon publication. Please visit the link below for more info: http://www.pillhillpress.com/writers-guidelines.html

Free Children's eBook Download(s)

FREE CHILDREN'S EBOOKS Sylvan Dell Publishing just released its NEW next generation eBooks. They are offering all 45 titles in a free eBook trial for the next 90 days. Below is a link to a 90-day trial of all 45 Sylvan Dell eBooks: http://www.sylvandellpublishing.com/ebooktrials.php?e=MSBL9J Code expiration date: 10/31/2009 For guided directions: http://www.sylvandellpublishing.com/documents/eBookOperatingInstructions.pdf