PitchWars pt. II: Mentor Bio/Wishlist Post!!!

LET'S GET RIGHT TO IT. It's very early in the morning, so have some doughnuts before we begin;

~~*~*~*~*Submissions for PitchWars start today ~*~*~*~

The cut off time to get your applications (query & first five pages of manuscript) in is 8AM EST on December 5.

Send your applications to brendadrakecontests@gmail.com. Writers can apply for up to 3 coaches.
The coaches' categories are set. Coaches can only consider the categories they've signed up for. Writers cannot apply for a coach that is not in their category.

For additional information about this contest go HERE.

- This is open to finished manuscripts only.

- You may only enter one manuscript.

- Only the genres requested by each coach will be considered for the contest.

Formatting:

Subject line: Pitch Wars Application: Coach Name you want to apply for: Title (Example: PitchWars Application: Brenda Drake: GONE WITH THE WIND)

Name: Your Name

Genre: The genre of your manuscript

Word Count: The word count of your manuscript

Query letter here (embedded in email). Single spaced. No indents. A space between each paragraph.

First five pages of the manuscript here (embedded in email). Single spaced. No indentions. A space between each paragraph.


~*~*AS A REMINDER~*~*: You can send an application for up to 3 coaches.








~*~*~BIO~*~*~*

Michelle is the YA author of PRETENDING TO BE ERICA, a young adult thriller forthcoming from Viking/Penguin in 2014. After four years and six books in the querying game, she's got a solid handle on how to pitch and polish a book for the querying ring. She's also exceptionally terrible at talking about herself, but would like you to know she's 22-going-on-old-cat-lady, likes baking, and can't contain her childish enthusiasm for video games, manga, pretty dresses, and Channing Tatum.  Her work is represented by the indomitable Jessica Faust of BookEnds, LLC. She's best at pinpointing weak spots in a manuscript and smoothing out a work's plotting pace. She's blunt, prefers to speak her mind, and won't mince words when it comes to critiquing, but is very good at what she does and hopes to work with someone fun and cool who loves their work and wants to see it become the best it can be!

***WISHLIST(now with a scary bacon face)***

All genres must be in the Young Adult (YA) category. I do not accept Adult, Middle Grade, or New Adult.

GENERAL WANTS (AKA things I LOVE to see in a manuscript)

- If you've got YA that addresses any of these, regardless of genre, send it my way!
- Quirky cast of deep, fully-realized characters
- Romance as a subplot, not the main plot.
- Main Character(s) with a strong, addictive voice. If you have a strong, unique narrator, I will definitely love love love it.

My face if you have these in your manuscript:

but i really do like you

SPECIFIC WANTS: (DISCLAIMER: IF YOU HAVE A GREAT YA AND AREN'T SURE IT FITS IN THESE GENRES, DON'T WORRY, SEND IT MY WAY ANYWAY)

- Contemporary: I prefer the darker, creepier contemporaries. Any contemporary with an edge (drugs, suicide, death in the family, plain old anger issues, etc) is often something I like. Thrillers and Horrors are right up my alley. Murder, kidnapped children, redemption, struggles, blackmail, mistaken identity - it spices things up. I want a legitimate sense of dread and tension. An artsy, literary twist to the work would be awesome, too; think Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma.

- Historical: I'm the biggest sucker for foreign history - usually not in the U.S. Give me Europe, Asia, Africa, all of it. Libby Bray's The Diviners is a great example set in the U.S. If it has magical/speculative elements, even better! I love reading about dresses, food, and plucky MCs who don't feel quite at home in their timeframe.

- SciFi: This genre is too often confused with Dystopian these days. I don't want future societies, but FAR future societies. Give me spaceships, space stations, aliens, lasers, viruses, robots, new planets, and crazy Blade Runner fashion. Give me grand adventures and a motley spaceship crew ala Joss Whedon's Firefly.


GOGOGO SUBMIT TO ME~~~


Check back soon for a complete list of the amazing agents participating in the contest. There's over a dozen!

Our mentors ...

Mister

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PITCH WARS PART 1

Good morning, guys! I'm psyched to be a mentor in Brenda Drake's PitchWars contest.

As some of you may know, I entered PRETENDING TO BE ERICA in one of her contests a while back, and got great response and feedback from it, so I can't stress enough what an awesome opportunity this is.

Without further ado, here are the details!

We're extremely excited to announce an upcoming event where agented authors, industry interns, and editors team up with aspiring writers to shine up their manuscripts and pitches to present to some awesome agents.

Here's the deets...

·         The teams will consist of 1 agented author or industry intern or editor (coaches) and 1 aspiring author.

·         November 26: The coaches (listed on the linky below) will post on their blogs what genre/category they want to coach. They'll be very specific genres. Aspiring writers will hop around and decide which coaches best fit their manuscripts.

·         November 26 - December 5: Aspiring writers will submit 3 "applications" to their top choices for coaches to the contest email (brendadrakecontests@gmail.com) during the allotted times (8AM to 8PM EST). That means, participants will send three separate emails to the contest email addressing each with one of their three top choices for coach.

     Coaches will read the applications and pick teammates.The coaches don't have to pick from their applications. If a coach passes on an application, it is then up for grabs and another coach, if they haven't connected to their applicants, can snatch it after notifying the applicant and if the applicant chooses the coach.

·         December 12: Teams will be announced. On the announcement post there will be instructions on how the winners must send their work.

·         December 12 through January 16: Each coach will read their teammate's manuscript and give general notes on any issues they find. The coach will help their teammate get his or her pitches ready for the agent round.

·         Note: The material for the agent round will be a 3 sentence pitch and the first 250 words of your manuscript. Coaches will read manuscripts and query letters only once and give notes. It is up to the writer to use the notes from their coaches to get the manuscript and query letter in as best shape as they can to send to requesting agents. The coaches will critique the three sentence pitch and first 250 words. The coaches will read them as many times as they deem necessary. In no way will writers expect the coaches to read the manuscript and query letter more than once or the pitches more than twice.

·         January 20: Coaches will submit shined pitches to the contest email.

·         January 23 and 24: Agents will read and make requests on the pitches they like (it is likely that not all participants will get requests).

·         January 25: We'll announce the team with the most requests and who will take home the winning prizes (an amazon gift card for each).

·         This is open to finished manuscripts only.

·         You may only enter one manuscript.

·         Only the genres requested by each coach will be considered for the contest.

 Formatting...

Subject line: Pitch Wars Application: Coach Name you want to apply for: Title (Example: Pitch Wars Application: Brenda Drake: GONE WITH THE WIND)

Name: Your Name

Genre: The genre of your manuscript

Word Count: The word count of your manuscript

Query letter here  (embedded in email). Single spaced. No indentions. A space between each paragraph.

First five pages of the manuscript here (embedded in email). Single spaced. No indentions. A space between each paragraph.

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REMINDER: You can send an application for up to 3 coaches.

Our mentors ...

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writing and how it saved me

Sometimes I stare out the window and just marvel. At rain, or clouds, or how the world keeps spinning. 

Mostly I marvel about how writing saved me. 

Once upon a time, I was a very different girl. A girl who didn't like herself. Or life. A girl who thought maybe if she left for good, off into that nothingness void, no one would mind. 

Today I researched the five stages of grief for a WIP and realized, when I was that Very Different Girl, I went through all five stages. And right on the edge of the last stage, Acceptance, right when I was getting used to the idea of a world without me, writing found me. 

Writing listened. It let me say the things I wanted to, the things I felt, without judging. It just blinked its cursor at me and gave me more page space. Infinite page space. I could say anything. So I said everything. 

Soon, I started looking forward to writing. I woke up happy that I got to write another day. I had a purpose. I could swallow anything life threw at me, as long as I could sit down at the end of the day and write until my fingers went numb. Writing let me create, and love, and hate, and cry, all at the same time. 

I didn't think about leaving life, anymore. 

I'm okay now, of course. Time heals all wounds. 

But writing helped me hang in there until Time could get to me. 

In a way, it's a religion. But writing is so much more than that. Maybe one day I'll be skilled enough to explain it right. 

It is a state of being. A force of energy. The prettiest, quietest supernova you will ever feel the heat of. 

I hope, I really, really really really really really really hope, that the love I have for it reaches you when you read my stuff. My books. There will be many. And I hope, wherever you are, you'll read them and feel my love in a non-creepy way.

Or in a creepy way. 

EITHER ONE WORKS.

Obsessions of september

these were a few of my obsessionthings this month

TIGHTS

WEIRD HAIR COLORS

weird hair colorsx2

SO GOOD SO GROSS SO GOOD

I hate arugula but the garden exploded.
apples+cheese makes it bearable.

HARRY PO- i mean SHERLOCK

found my old cartridge! 700mil points on
sapphire board BEAT THAT

Writing wise: 

-Revisions for Project 1 done/sent off to amazing agent d=(´▽｀)=b

-6k written for Project 2 ｡◕‿◕｡

-11k written for Project 3 book ｡◕‿◕｡

-Still can't figure out which project to focus on more ( ≧Д≦)