For the past several weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of participating — with complete anonymity — in a unique writing contest. It’s called WRiTE CLUB, and it’s hosted by D.L. Hammons. The concept is simple: entrants were asked to submit a 500-word piece of fiction under a pen name. I’d learned about the contest from my […]
Articles on Pitching Contests
Here you'll find articles on pitching contests for aspiring authors, from one-day Twitter pitching events (#SFFpit and #PitMad) to longer-running, Brenda-Drake-style events like Pitch Madness and Pitch Wars.
Pitch Wars: One Mentor’s Feedback
I’ve finished responding to all 74 writers who submitted to me during #PitchWars. It took me a long time to write these responses, but I enjoyed it and I felt I owed it to all of them. Even though I could only pick two for #TeamBioMind, all Pitch Wars submitters should be proud of two things. […]
Lessons and Hard Numbers from PitchWars
Earlier this year, I asked Brenda Drake if she was interested in some technical help for her next pitching contest. Specifically, I told her that PitchWars and PitchMadness might go a lot more smoothly if the submissions were done by form rather than by e-mail. Because you can control a form. You can prevent submitters […]
Pitch Wars #AskMentor Highlights
Today the hopeful applicants of #PitchWars had the chance to ask questions of the 70+ mentors for the contest. We had spectacular participation during both 1-hour chat sessions! At one point I realized I’d fallen 20 minutes and 170 tweets behind on the #AskMentor hashtag (which was trending on Twitter). Talk about exciting! Because it […]
Breakdown of the First #SFFpit
Last week’s #SFFpit event on Twitter proved a smashing success! Leading up to pitch day, we had a few events: a warm-up event the week before, when I challenged authors to craft pitches for Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. The day before the contest, many authors made intros on the hashtag with “two truths and a lie.” […]







