Natalie Fischer, and the YAtopia Pitch Contest.
Natalie Fischer is an agent with Bradford Lit agency, and there's a 2-sentence pitch contest on the YAtopia blog that can get your work placed in front of her for review. Click on "YAtopia Pitch Contest" above to be linked directly to the YAtopia blog for details of the contest. Plus, it's a neat site all on its own for those who write for young adults.
Boy, I've been whining about writing a synopsis, but boiling your book down to two sentences is tricky stuff! Good luck to any and all who enter this contest. I'm entering it now, as we speak, because part of it is to post about the contest with a link to the site. Oh, ho, look at me multitasking! A to Z Challenge AND entering a pitch contest. It's probably for the best, as my "N's" were rather lame. This one is much better than I had planned.
N is also for...
Networking.
Really, these blogs are all a form of networking for our books or whatever else we have going. The bloggers I've met through this challenge make up a wonderful and supportive community. I look forward to being able to keep up with everyone's blogs better once the challenge is complete, as I'm a bit overwhelmed right now, especially with everything else going on (contest, upcoming conference, life).
Other ways to network include writer's groups, online forums, social networking sites, and websites. I need to start harassing my husband to get my website started, but I have no idea what I'll put on there until I actually know I have a book coming out. Well, okay, I have ideas, but not as many as I'd like, and who knows if they will work. Still, when I'm looking at a business for anything these days, I go to the computer and look to see if they have a website. If they don't, and I have no good way to check them out, there is a lower chance that I will utilize them. That's just the way it is. I like being able to peruse the business and what it offers from the safety and privacy of my own home before going there in person.
What have you found to be a good form of networking? Do you have a website other than your blog? Feel free to post it in comments and share it with us.
Happy Writing!
9 comments:
My blog is my only online presence and I'm still faffing my way through that. I'm finding even that is taking away from time I should be writing. It's all very time consuming.
-mood
Moody Writing
Thanks for pointing the contest out. You're right, two sentences is a challenge!
My Blog
Thanks for stopping by my blog! I have really enjoyed the A-Z challenge and I've met a lot of great writers along the way. I live in a small town and if there are other writers living in my community they must be as much of a hermit as I am! All of the people I've met via A-Z have been very friendly and encouraging. I think this challenge has been a good form of networking. I do have another writing website and I go by the pen name Jot on that one. It's at http://jotslunaradventure.com
Hi Shannon,
I am certainly enjoying your blog. You write such good posts each day, and everything that you say is meaningful.
Thanks so much for the blogging award. I'll be posting on it very soon.
I think that blogging is a wonderful way to network. I have meet people from around the world that I would never have if I didn't have my blog. I also enjoy networking in my small community ... getting to know others and running into them around town. Also, Facebook has helped me to regain my long lost peeps, which I am grateful for. I think that each forum serves its own unique purpose, and I try to use them for the best way that they work for me.
I'm so glad that you have befriended me through the land of A-Z, and look forward to getting to know you better over time.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Kathy M.
A fellow Colorado writer! Woohoo.
The blogging community is great. So supportive. I also attend several conferences. I like the face-to-face networking with writers and agents too. Nice to meet you.
Just the blog (and facebook) at the moment. I want a website. Need a website. Really have no idea about how to go about doing that myself. No money to pay for it. And the blogging is already taking up so much time that I don't feel like I have any brain power left to figure out a website, too. Unless I want to give up on the writing completely and go into web design. heh Because I'm already completely behind on the writing.
>sigh<
Blogs are good for networking. Also writers groups. My group is outstanding. And we are running a writing conference for teens and have a bunch of published authors out to teach break out sessions for it. The kids get to meet authors of the books they read and authors get to mingle with their target audience. And we get to mingle with both! Win-win. (=
I find that I judge so much about a business from its website -- whether it looks professional, whether it is well-written, whether it gives me in-depth information about the business. With books, I don't necessarily get frustrated if an author doesn't have a website, but I'm much more likely to read an author if I can read their blog and develop a relationship with them.
Speaking of networking, I nominated you for the "Versatile Blogger" award at my website, but I see you've already received it from Andrew. Still, consider yourself awarded. :-)
Mood, I agree. Though I think things will calm down on my part once the challenge is over. Still, I will have to work on keeping up on it.
Catherine, good luck!
Sherri, thanks for the link!
Kathy, thank you! I agree that each forum seems to serve a different purpose. I enjoy getting a little taste of home through your blogs.
L.G., is that the Maroon Bells behind you? I desperately want to get up there during fall to get some pictures. Are you going to the Pikes Peak Writer's conference or the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writer's one in September?
Andrew, writing comes first, of course! I know what you mean, though. I think you can set up free websites via Yahoo somehow, and I've been told it's very easy to do, as you're using templates. A friend of mine just set herself up a website that way for her psychiatric practice.
Jo, that is awesome about the teen writing conference! What a wonderful idea.
Kiernan, thank you! I agree on the websites. If I go to a professional website and it is riddled with bad grammar or otherwise messed up, I automatically think less of the business. It's a representative of the company, just as an employee would be, almost. I've just started taking the time to look at author's sites recently.
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