Children's Picture Book Contest

Cassie88

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I saw a blurb in Woman's Day about a children's picture book contest. (No illustrations) I think the entries must be postmarked on or before 9/30/05. For more details, go to:

www.womansday.com/scholastic
 

rhymegirl

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Thanks, Cassie.

I just read the rules for how to enter. Am I wrong in my understanding: It sounds like, if you have to fold the paper in half and only put 2 lines of copy on each page, therefore you would be handwriting the story for them????
 

Stephanie

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That's exactly how I read it, rhymegirl. I suppose they're targeting people who are not writers, and so are making word count and "manuscript format" as simple as possible.

What I really don't understand, though, is that - okay, they'll publish - but they don't pay the author anything...s/he only gets 10 copies of the edition and no cash at all.
 

Inspired

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There's no way I'd enter that contest. It is demeaning to professional writers and rips off the "winner." It also teaches those who enter the most improper way of submitting.
 
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rhymegirl

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Wow. I must have been really tired last night when I was reading about this contest. I didn't notice there's no money involved. All you get is copies of the book? So they would get all the profit, right? That doesn't sound right.
 

Cassie88

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No, there is no money involved. But, the winner will have a published work to show other publishers. I don't know. If someone has a good idea for a picture book, what the hell? There's also no entry fee. Anyway, I just wanted to share the info, that's all.
 

rhymegirl

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It was nice of you to share that info, Cassie. :)

It is now up to each person who reads the info to decide whether or not she wants to enter.
 

luv2writestuff

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Picture books (good ones) are HARD to write! If I'm going to work that hard (and I am working on picture book manuscripts) ... I'm not going to enter them in a contest ... with no $$$ ... I'm going to enter them into an envelope and mail it to a publisher! : ) And, if that publisher mails it back ... I'll get my critique group to go over it (again) and send it out to another publisher! : )

Of course, if you're just doing this for fun ... NOTHING wrong with a FUN contest! And, yes, it will give you a publishing credit in your file and there is nothing wrong with that! (The copies with the published ms are nice bragging rights too!)

Speaking of ... I better get to doing my corrections on my picture book manuscripts! : )

Thanks for the notice about the contest .... please know that it is NICE to know about contests ... even if you decide not to enter a particlular one.
I think I have a couple to tell about ... but I'll post a new thread so as not to "hijack" yours! : )

Blessings,
Debbie
 
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sthrnwriter

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For those of you who are thinking about entering, you may want to reconsider. There is kind of a cash prize. You get $40 if your book is published solely online. Yeah if you win you get publishing credits but something y'all haven't noticed i guess is that you always have to pay taxes on the prizes that you won. So technically if your book isn't published online your paying for winning.

I don't know about y'all but if I'm gonna be published, I'd rather win something more than just some complimentary books, a publishing credit and possibly a little cash, especially if there is a chance I'll have to be paying for more than what I won. But thats just me.
 

stormie

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Cassie88 said:
No, there is no money involved. But, the winner will have a published work to show other publishers. I don't know. If someone has a good idea for a picture book, what the hell? There's also no entry fee. Anyway, I just wanted to share the info, that's all.

This contest was posted back in July under the Bewares and Background Board as well as here. Cassie, that is nice of you to share the info, but copyright goes to Scholastic, not the author, as well as they keep all rights. Therefore, if they decide to publish the grand prize winner's book, the author gets a few books and maybe some money. I forget the small amount. So, if that book does take-off and become a best seller, the author is out of quite a bit of money. No royalties. Also, they don't have to put your name on the book. They get the copyright.

Publishers, by the way, do not want pb's submitted the way Woman's Day and Scholastic ask the entrants to submit their work. Proper ms. formatting, even for pb's, is the way one would format most any ms.

Also, look at the address. It's in PA, not NYC.
 
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rhymegirl

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stormie said:
This contest was posted back in July under the Bewares and Background Board as well as here.

Are you sure? I just looked in both places in July and didn't see anything about this.