Category Archives: submission

Dear Nona,

Congratulations! Your manuscript, ‘Searching for Sara’, has received a “CERTIFICATE OF MERIT” in the Deep River Books Writers Contest. While you did not win first place, your manuscript was narrowed to a highly selected group of finalists and we congratulate you for your fine work. You are to be applauded for such a fine achievement as a new writer. We are sending, by mail, your Certificate of Merit certificate.

As you know, Deep River Books is a full-service partner publisher. Our goal is to publish the best manuscripts from new authors and we certainly feel yours fits into that category.

Continue reading →

Update:

Entry submitted @ 6:48pm PST!

As part of the entry process a 300 word pitch was required. You know? A summary of your novel? The hardest part of the novel writing process?

Well, I do not know what happened, but today I was able to write the synopsis for my historical romance, Searching for Sara, and it sounded great! Once I trimmed a bit of the excess, it was a succinct 300 words! (*the synopsis can be found on Searching for Sara‘s Bookshelf page)

What clicked?

Was it the fact that I began to write it last night in my head?

Was it the editing Q & A session Sunday evening?

Was it the constant barrage of questions from friends and co-workers asking me “What is it about?” that finally made the entire story roll out in my head?

Was it the 60k of words that I have since trimmed out of the manuscript?

I don’t know, but whatever it was I thank God for it. Writing a clear, concise yet drawing synopsis is HELL ON EARTH, and I have now made it to level number 3 of 9….

________________

Today is the first day of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award submissions. Only the first 5,000 entries will be accepted, so time is of the essence. Unfortunately, after performing some heft edits of my 2010 NaNovel, I will need to add nearly 8k words (and write the ending) before it is ready for submission. Will I make it before the 5,000 entrants cap is reached? It is hard to say. Perhaps I should enter one of my other novels? Does it clarify that it must be a NaNovel? No. In fact, here are the clarifications for entry:
Each Manuscript, Excerpt, and Pitch Must:

• be the original creation of entrant;
• be fictional;
• be in the English language;
• be of interior black and white text with no images in the document;
• not currently or previously have been the subject of a publishing agreement with any publishing house (but an entrant may submit his/her self-published novel if he/she retains all worldwide distribution rights in and to the novel);
• not include the entrant’s name anywhere in the Manuscript, Excerpt or the Pitch; and
• meet the content guidelines found at http://www.amazon.com/contentguidelines

See? Nothing about that at all! So, I believe I will enter one of my complete novels….

Want additional information? See below!
To register and enter you will need to submit:

• The full/complete version of your manuscript (the “Manuscript”), which must be a novel between 50,000 and 150,000 words;
• Up to the first 5,000 words, but no less than 3,000 words, of your Manuscript, excluding any table of contents, foreword, and acknowledgments (the “Excerpt”);
• A pitch statement (cover letter/summary) of up to 300 words (the “Pitch”);
• Other registration information as asked for on the entry form (such as name, contact information, book title), and
• An author photo (if desired), which must be in .jpg format (at least 72 dpi and 500×468 pixels)

Each Manuscript should:

• be in Times New Roman and 12-point font; and
• be double spaced and paginated with a 1-inch margin on all sides (in a manner enabling reformat to single-space display easily, i.e. no “hard” returns to achieve double spacing).