I am doing this now - entering competitions - I don't like it, and I was gutted when my beloved book was not even long-listed for the Bath Competition. I tell myself that there is nothing different about a competition, as with submitting to an agent, it is just a matter of the reader's taste.
Today I submitted a 5,000 word entry to Nibfest - first prize: lunch with an agent I've just submitted TRF to. Well, let's see. I submitted Islanders - I have about 12,000 words of this - because I felt it had the zippiness that they seem to want - the characters are, some of them, young. I know that YA dystopia is an over-subscribed market - but it isn't going to be a YA novel - I don't think anyway. We'll see. I didn't want to submit GATD because I don't think the first 5,000 words, although engaging in some ways, don't quite get going in the same way. I may be wrong, but if I'm right they will need an awful lot more work done on them before they go anywhere.
Today I submitted a 5,000 word entry to Nibfest - first prize: lunch with an agent I've just submitted TRF to. Well, let's see. I submitted Islanders - I have about 12,000 words of this - because I felt it had the zippiness that they seem to want - the characters are, some of them, young. I know that YA dystopia is an over-subscribed market - but it isn't going to be a YA novel - I don't think anyway. We'll see. I didn't want to submit GATD because I don't think the first 5,000 words, although engaging in some ways, don't quite get going in the same way. I may be wrong, but if I'm right they will need an awful lot more work done on them before they go anywhere.
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