Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award 2011

writerinthenorth · Jan 29, 2011

After some consideration I have decided once again to enter the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award with my recently-completed historical novel Mr Stephenson's Regret. I entered last year with my thriller 11:59 and managed to get to the semi-final stage. The book was subsequently published by Wild Wolf.

I have a feeling it will be more difficult to get so far with an historical novel, but it will be interesting to find out. There are several stages to the competition, or should I say hurdles. From a possible 10,000 entries that start out as runners in the two categories (General Fiction and Young Adult Fiction) only two will cross the finish line - one in each category - while bodies pile up at the fences behind them. The first fence is The Pitch - a maximum of 300 words to interest the judges enough to put you through to the next round. There is much massacre here; a maximum of 1,000 entrants in each category will be allowed to progress to the Second Round, so most poor souls won't be given the opportunity to have one word of their manuscript read before they are unceremoniously culled. It's a hard world.

I've posted my pitch at my blog writer in the north for anyone interested. There are a few days of edit time before the deadline (6 Feb) so if anyone has some valuable advice to give me about the pitch, please do not hesitate. It might save me falling flat on my face.

tammay · Jan 30, 2011

Good luck to you! I like the pitch. I'm a huge fan of Victorian-era fiction, so the best of luck to you

.

Tam

Puma · Feb 2, 2011

Hi Writer - I usually refuse to go offsite to look at anything, but did after I noticed you're a newcomer and quite a few posts away from being able to put this in Share Your Work.

I wasn't particularly thrilled with your pitch (I would equate a pitch to the material on the back cover of a book that catches readers). But, since you made it to the semi-final stage last year, you may be right in the way you did it. I personally would have expected something more dynamic.

Aside from the tone, I was concerned you didn't specify the locale for your story until near the end of the pitch - and that's very important, at least it is in my opinion.

If you haven't, you might want to take a trip over to Query Letter Hell in Share Your Work and read some of the query synopses paragraphs people are putting out - and then see how your pitch compares to theirs. You can do that, and even leave comments on them before you arrive at the magic 50 posts to put up a piece of your own for comments. Hope this helps. Puma

writerinthenorth · Feb 4, 2011

My pitch

Hi Puma

Thanks for taking the trouble to comment. I'm concerned to hear the pitch strikes you as not dynamic enough. I'll take a look at the site you describe.

writerinthenorth.blogspot.com

aruna · Feb 4, 2011

Writerinthenorth, I agree with Puma; I think the pitch doesn't do justice to the potential of your novel, which sounds like something I'd like to read...
Unfortunately, submissions have closed for the General Fiction category of ABNA so you can't edit any more. But you never know; it's all subjective and you may get a history buff as a reader who loves the idewa of your pitch and pushed you through.
In any case, here's another ABNA therad where other people who have entered have posted; we can watch each others' progress there.

Julie Worth · Feb 5, 2011

This doesn't read like a pitch. More like a high school book report.

aruna · Feb 5, 2011

hmmm -- it's a bit confusing, with both these threads having exactly the same title. I was goig to ask you "what pitch"? till I realised you were on the History thread!
Maybe a mod could change one of the titles to distinguish them.

ETA -- there IS a difference. The other one is a question!

writerinthenorth · Feb 25, 2011

Over the first hurdle

So, I got through the pitch round. Thanks to everyone who 'pitched in' with comments, suggestions and good wishes.

writerinthenorth

aruna · Feb 25, 2011

Well done and good luck!

writerinthenorth · Mar 22, 2011

Quarter final

Just discovered I've reached the quarter final (last 250 in General Fiction) with 'Mr Stephenson's Regret' so I'm pleased with that.

Writer in the North

ArcadiaDarrell · Mar 22, 2011

^ Congrats

aruna · Mar 22, 2011

Well done and good luck.

writerinthenorth · Mar 24, 2011

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award

I've posted my entry extract together with the comments from the ABNA reviewers at my Writer in the North blog http://writerinthenorth.blogspot.com/

I would welcome comments.

writerinthenorth · Mar 28, 2011

Extract from Mr Stephenson's Regret

ABNA have now made the quarter final extracts available for general review. It would be really helpful to have reviews of my extract on site, so if you have time please visit, read and review. My category is Historical Fiction and my extract is no. 40. There is rather a long-winded link below which should take you direct to the Kindle download link. Many thanks.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004TEYSXS/?tag=absowrit-20

aruna · Mar 28, 2011

So, does one need a Kindle to read these extracts?

writerinthenorth · Mar 28, 2011

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award

If you don't have a Kindle, you can download a free thing from Amazon called Kindle for your PC, which allows you to read Kindle stuff on your computer - it's very quick and easy to load.
The link is http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kcp_pc_mkt_lnd?docId=1000426311

Alternatively you can go to my blog posting on the subject and read the extract there , then simply put your customer review on the Amazon site without downloading the extract.

Here's the link to the blog posting.
http://writerinthenorth.blogspot.com/2011/03/regret-reaches-abna-quarter-final.html

writerinthenorth · Apr 26, 2011

Semi Finalists announced

Just found out that I've made the semifinal of the ABNA Award with Mr Stephenson's Regret, so I'm naturally chuffed about that.

Writer in the North

aruna · Apr 27, 2011

Hey, well done! Why not join the other ABNA thread; it's read by more people than in this forum.

Puma · Apr 29, 2011

Congratulations! It's obvious my assessment of your pitch was way off, which is very interesting to me. Now to think about whether that equates to any differences in the way novels should be pitched to agents. You may have helped us more than you expected when you posted, writerinthenorth. Thank you. Puma

pdr · Apr 29, 2011

I've...

had another read of David's pitch. Its task was to make the judges want to read the novel.

I think it did just that, examining not just the plot, but also the motivations, conflicts and relevance to today's readers.

I bring this up because I wonder how different the pitch/query would be if it had been written for an agent.

Puma · Apr 30, 2011

How on earth did you re-find the pitch, pdr? All I found was a blog of quotes.

I'm curious too about pitch versus query ... and all the things we hear about hook, hook, hook. When I read his pitch it came no where close to exciting me. So now I'm puzzled. Puma

fourlittlebees · Apr 30, 2011

Whatever you do, don't judge the ABNA pitch as anything that will net agent attention. It's completely hit and miss, to the point where some people who've submitted the exact same pitch for the same (revised) novel see different results at the pitch round. I'm convinced that until you go from quarters to semis, it's mostly like a lottery with a bit of talent required for entry. Very mixed bag until that point.

writerinthenorth · Apr 30, 2011

Puma said:
How on earth did you re-find the pitch, pdr? All I found was a blog of quotes.

Here's the link to the pitch, Puma. I posted it back in January.

I think I would pitch in much the same way to an agent, for better or worse.

fourlittlebees · Apr 30, 2011

writerinthenorth said:
I think I would pitch in much the same way to an agent, for better or worse.

That's not saying anything negative about your pitch, writer (TBH, I haven't even read it). The ABNA judging, however, while it mimics the query/partial/full process of finding an agent, doesn't utilize the same types of professionals. You can have an excellent query that nets tons of requests from agents that fails at pitch for ABNA, and vice versa. But going through ABNA pitches to find something to model queries after is a bad idea.

Puma · Apr 30, 2011

I just re-read it too. I think I'd classify it as a cross between a synopsis and a review, probably closer to a review. It's looking in from a distance rather than up close and personal and written objectively.

As I said. Very interesting. Food for thought. Puma

Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award 2011

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