Writing Contests, Writing Projects, & Writer Recognition
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1st Place Winner Receives $300 and a $1,800 Editing and Publishing Package from CreateSpace.Contest Now Open! Enter a writing competition to see who can craft the most compelling start to a novel. Whether you write Romance, Science Fiction, Romance, Non-fiction, or some other genre, the only criteria is that you write a start that will keep us reading.
Contest submission deadline: June 22, 2012.
. Previous Writing Competitions
Win $150 By Writing a Compelling Essay On a Great Sports MomentSports are not only a form of exercise and entertainment, but they have had a profound impact on society, politics, and culture. From the Miracle on Ice (shown in the image above) when the U.S.A defeated the Soviet hockey team in the 1980 Winter Olympics to the Japense women winning the 2010 Soccer World Cup in the same year as that country's devestating earthquake, sports have helped to define our lives. For this contest, choose a great moment in sports and share your thoughts on that event. You can decribe what made it a great moment, how the moment paralleled events in your life, or any other rumination on the event and its impact on you or the broader world. See the links below for some examples of great sporting moments to help get you started. Each piece must be longer than 1,000 words and shorter than 5,000 words. The winner will receive $150 in cash. Judging The judge for this contest is noted sports writer Saul Wisnia. 
SAUL WISNIA is a former sports and news correspondent for The Washington Post and feature writer for The Boston Herald. He has authored, co-authored or contributed to numerous books on Boston baseball history, including his latest -- Fenway Park: The Centennial http://amzn.to/qWjQRS. His essays and articles have appeared in Sports Illustrated, Red Sox Magazine, and The Boston Globe, and he shares Fenway reflections in cyberspace at http://saulwisnia.blogspot.com/. Wisnia, who lives 6.78 miles from MLB's oldest ballpark, can be reached at saulwizz@gmail.com or @saulwizz.
Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on January 31, 2012 Prize: $150. How to Submit Your Sports Essay See all Sports Essays Competition, Rules, Regulations, & Details
Give Us Your Best Book Pitch and You Might Win $150Pitching a book is often the second most important task after writing it. A good pitch gets agents, publishers, and readers interested enough to take a look. To help you craft the best pitch and provide a bit of pitch inspiration, we're holding a book pitch contest. Post your pitch on TheNextBigWriter, get feedback on it from other writers, and see if it gets noticed. Not only will you get feedback from other authors on how compelling the pitch is, but the best pitch will win $150. The pitch should include: Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on November 4, 2011 Prize: The author of the best pitch will receive $150. See all Book Pitches Competition, Rules, and Regulations
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Get Us Excited About Watching Paint Dry and You Could Win $150 and Online ExposureWe all know that watching paint dry is right up there with watching grass grow for fun things to do. The challenge of this writing contest is to create the most exciting story on the topic of watching paint dry. Each piece must be longer than 1,000 words and shorter than 5,000 words. The winner will receive a $150 in cash and receive the option of having their work displayed in front of over 250,000 readers. Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on September 29, 2011 Prize: First place winner receives $150 and will have their writing featured on the front page of Booksie.com for hundreds of thousands of readers. How to Submit Your Watching Paint Drying Short Story See all Watching Paint Dry Entries Competition, Rules, and Regulations
1st Place Winner Receives $300 and a $1,700 Publishing Package from CreateSpace.July 30, 2011: Contest winners announced. Congratulations to the 2011 winners. They are: Main Competition: - QUANTRILL'S RAIDERS by crazeesharon - Moby's Dick: The Short, Absurd Life (and death) of Moby Gunderson by Jeni Decker Previous Winners What is the Strongest Start Novel Competition? It is the only live, online novel writing competition for unfinished books and novels. That means you can enter with a draft or unfinished manuscript and that you will receive feedback on your submission as the competition progresses. Feedback that you can use to improve you submission before the competition deaadline. The competition is meant to motivate writers to finish their books and to edit what they have written. And of course, to reward the writers who have done a fantastic job of honing their three starting chapters to page turning perfection Stay in the Know. The 2011 competition is over, but leave us your email and receive advanced news on the 2012 Strongest Start Novel Competition.
$200 in Prizes for Taking a Trip Through TimeYou just received access to a time machine. You sit down and choose a date (in the past or future) and location where some significant event is occurring. You take a deep breath and then pull the lever. Tell us in a Droubble (a story of exactly 200 words) where you go and what significant event you witness or participate in. Be original and tell a story within the confines of the Droubble limitation. Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on February 22, 2011 Prize: First place winner receives $100. Two runner-ups will receive $50 each. How to Submit Your Time Travel Droubble See all Time Machine Droubble entries Competition, Rules, and Regulations
Winner Receives a $500 Publishing ContractTheNextBigWriter has partnered with costumealibi.com to bring you two great contests. The first is a Halloween Short Story Contest. The short story should be between 2,500 and 5,000 words with a Halloween theme. There are no genre restrictions. Anything goes. We are looking for the most engaging, can't-put-it-down story to feature on the costumealibi.com Halloween Stories page. Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on October 5, 2010 Prize: $500 Publishing Contract How to Submit Your Halloween Entry See all Halloween Entries Competition, Rules, and Regulations
Winner Receives a $100 Publishing ContractTheNextBigWriter has partnered with costumealibi.com to bring you two great contests. The second contest is a costume-oriented flash fiction piece. The flash fiction piece should have a costume theme and doesn't necessarily have to be about Halloween. It should be a humorous story between 500 and 1,000 words. Judging criteria -- The laugh-out-loudest story wins. Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on October 5, 2010 Prize: $100 Publishing Contract How to Submit Your Costume Flash Entry Competition, Rules, and Regulations
The winning entry will receive a $100 publishing contact and will be featured in front of hundreds of thousands of readers.Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on March 1, 2010Have a good idea for a flash story? Or maybe you've already written one. Post it as part of the TheNextBigWriter's 2010 Flash Writing Contest. If we like it enough, you'll receive $100 and be featured on the homepage of Booksie.com, a site that receives 500,000 reader visits per month. See all 2010 flash entries. Competition, Rules, and Regulations .
Join A Project to Create the Internet's First Workshop - Based Novel - The CloudWinning entries receive a publishing contact for inclusion in the published novel.Deadline: 11:59 PM ET on January 21, 2010 TheNextBigWriter in conjunction with Odin Roark of iPOV BOOKS present the first workshop-built-novel. The novel will be comprised of individual chapters/short stories written by different writers from TheNextBigWriter around a central theme and premise. The CloudThe novel project called THE CLOUD is a concept created by Odin Roark based on a premise that challenges religion, commerce, and science, as well as general behavior in the 21st century. The plot involves reactions to a dark gray cloud that takes residence over the skies of Las Vegas in August of 2013 and is still there at the book’s conclusion in January 2014. The genre of this book is literary. Learn more about The Cloud Project. Awards: The writers whose stories are selected as winners will receive a Publishing Contract to have their story published as part of the The Cloud Anthology. 50% of the net proceeds will be equally shared by the estimated 15 to 20 authors. 50% of the remaining net proceeds from the sale of the book will go to the formation of a charity fund developed by Odin Roark that will provide computers for children in developing countries. Submit Your Entry to The Cloud See all The Cloud entries. Competition, Rules, and Regulations
Create the Most Horrible Wedding That's Out of This WorldThe theme of this contest is the wedding that goes horribly, horribly wrong. But as a twist, the story must be set in a science fiction or fantasy setting. Other than that, use your imagination and have fun. We're looking for the most creative, most entertaining story. One that melds a disasterous wedding with a credible science fiction and fantasy setting. Key elements that we'll be looking for include: Well conceived characters Credible science fiction and fantasy settings A creative and original story A well written story. The story should be a minimum of 1,000 words but under 3,500 words. Prize: $100. Contest submission deadline: August 31, 2009. Writing contest rules and details |See all entries .
Can You Write a Chaiku that Rocks?Submit a Chaiku with a nature theme. Writer about plants, trees, weather, ocean, or anything else in the natural world that inspires your muse. We will be judging the Chaikus on their ability to tell a story or paint a scene within the constraints of the Chaiku format. So what is a Chaiku? Chaiku is a neologism derived from the first two letters of Chinese
and the last four of HAIKU. It refers to the notion that Chinese poetic
meter can play the same role as the meter of haiku in the composition
of verse in English. Four words of one syllable per line Prize: $50. Contest submission deadline: August 15, 2009. Writing contest rules and details |See all entries .
A Short Story Contest with Cash, Publishing, and FeedbackMezzo Magazine has asked TheNextBigWriter to help it find a special story to publish in their September 2009 debut issue. The challenge of this competition is to create a short story that has the right ingredients to be featured in Mezzo Magazine's September issue. So what is Mezzo Magazine looking for? In their words: "The stories we publish are intelligent and creative but with no pretence of intellectual aspirations. We want to enjoy the read, not study the text. We appreciate edgy and irreverent writing that makes us see, hear and be in the story. Our editors use their judgment, and review the following elements to score your submission. Opening lines - Does the beginning make you want to read more? Plot - is there a continuous thread of suspense? Setting - Are the sensory details effective? Voice and Tone - Is the narrative voice consistent and unobtrusive? Conflict - Are the stakes and the conflicts surrounding them clear? Dialogue - Is the dialogue natural sounding? Is it easy to read? Resolutions - Does the story have a satisfying ending?" The subject is your choice, but no stories with excessive gore, violence, profanity, hate or discrimination. The story should be a minimum of 1,000 words but under 3,500 words. Prize: $200 and publication in Mezzo Magazine's debut September 2009 issue. Contest submission deadline: June 30, 2009. Writing contest rules and details |See all entries | Visit Mezzo Magaine . TheNextBigWriter Top 10 Novel Program:
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