Entering A Writing Contest

I Entered A Writing Contest

I entered a writing contest

I had some time to squeeze in to do this, between the cascade of people coming to visit us recently. We had two get-togethers in one week! We are not people who entertain. We are not accustomed to playing the host.
Nobody ever visits us, so it's weird.
Spring is weird.

I only found out about the contest because I was compiling a list of literary awards. I wanted to know which were awarded in particular categories, especially in competitions. Lo and behold, I found one through a website that is a writer's guild as well. And wouldn't you know it? They hold contests.



I found this at the very beginning of March (it's the very beginning of April now) with a one-month deadline. The contest only asked for the first 30 pages, typed up manuscript style.
No problem!

Except they want romance in the theme of every entry.
Problem.

Challenge Number 1

I found a romance writing contest! By accident.

I suck at romance

Now I really dawdled in the beginning. Why? Romance really isn't my forte. Fantasy and Sci-Fi is more my thing. But before discounting this writing adventure, I chose to take on the challenge to expand my breadth of creativity. Could I pull it off?
No idea.
Well, I certainly couldn't write it.

Challenge Number 2

A few words about my personality...
I'm a person naturally drawn to horror movies and the occult. Which makes me a shitty fucking Catholic. Or a perfect one? (fire and brimstone and shit?!) But I take this dark hammer and do nail down some damn entertaining fare.

The dark writer hammering away at the keyboard

However, in the romance arena, it's a useless gift.

The flowchart itself is all chronological steps, charting out the voyage of the protagonist. Totally devoid of emotional conflict and what not. Why? Because I wouldn't even know where to insert the emotions, and the porn rated hawtness.
Or even how to write smut.
Hmm.

See, upon writing my first iteration of this story, it came off unusually dark. So dark, it even made me uncomfortable! Cringey, even! I had to trim off the last 12 pages and do a rewrite.
Fuk.
I had to wash my brain away with a splash of tequila, no joke.

So the contest requirement entailed submitting 30 pages. I had a good 4 chapters in there. The rewrite came in exactly halfway.

I had never anticipated my personality to be a detriment to my writing, at any point. My unique traits. My way of being. My own personal character. Writing intimate scenes that makes me cringe, and if necessary, I do so with utmost reluctance. (see, this just isn't part of my natural personal makeup) This particular unknown challenge certainly took me by surprise!

Learning to navigate around this hurdle in the future will also yield surprising results, I imagine. Must work on it, pronto!

Challenge Number 3

When I get stuck writing

As always, and whenever I get stuck, I charted the story out on my flowchart software. I breathed a sigh of relief.

How do I get over being stuck in writing? Make a flowchart, of course!

This is the only way I know how to position ideas around on a canvas.
I took it a step further.
Not only did I make the longest printout ever, I also added my chicken scratch penmanship onto it.
Apologies for the shitty light situation in the photos.

My book outline, flowchart edition

I taped all pages together to form that paper train monstrosity you see before you.

My book outline, folded like an accordion

And this is the entire story laid out in long format.

My book outline, all stretched out beginning to end

I just used the tape measure, clocking in at 5ft 1in. evenly! It's quite a bit.

So, I got to typing.

Challenge Number 4

Yes, roll your eyes at me, for I am one of those tiresome folks that meet deadlines at the last minute.
Although to be fair, I had a lot of distractions in the month of March...!
So here I was, trying to enter a few short hours before a midnight deadline.

I finished with about 3-4 hrs. to spare. Not bad! Even with a last minute rewrite. I work well under a kind of pressure. I'm pretty good at being punctual and meeting deadlines and people for meetings. This just fell right into my wheelhouse for meting out challenges.

And now for the twist in the story.

Challenge Number 5

The formatting. Oh, THE FORMATTING!

I'll explain this pain in the ass. With pictures, of course!


I type everything in Open Office software. It's open-source, so it's free.
For various reasons, I do not use Microsoft Word anymore. So! Open source software it is!

Open Office saves every document in an .odt file format. The contest rules asked for the entries to be saved in .doc or .rtf format. That's where I ran into trouble.

My manuscript in Open Office .odt file format

OO let me save my manuscript in .doc, but surprise! Does not let me open it afterward. What's the point in that? It showed a 'runtime error' window when I tried opening the file in OO, and created error ghost files on my desktop. How can I double check something before sending it out? Short answer: I can't.

I would need Microsoft Word to open it in, to check it for formatting errors. Which defeats the purpose of saving it as .doc in OO.
*sigh

Open Office gives you the option to save in Microsoft Word .doc format, but not to open it later

Open Office only allows you to open a 'Read Only' copy of the .doc file format you just saved. It always results in an error window.

The resulting error window

Open Office leaves ghost files in error that are dimmed out

Then I save in .rtf format instead. That one I knew I could check because I have WordPad on my computer (comes free with Microsoft operating system) But that took the manuscript formatting I so carefully placed in, and shredded it to hell. Jargon, misalignment, etc. And crunched all my words to single-spaced. Terrific. Wish I'd taken a screenshot though. Ah well.


This sucks because the little voice in the back of my mind had shouted at me to give it a quick look-see before submitting it. Sure enough, some minimal punctuation errors and typos appeared. I corrected it, of course.
But that is why I had to re-open the damn document in the first place.

So I cut and pasted all those single-spaced words right back into the original .odt, then saved again in .rtf and re-opened. It looked decent this time, with formatting more or less in tact.

Here is what I ended up with:

What my manuscript looks like saved in .rtf format, opened in Open Office - it's perfectly formatted!

What my manuscript looks like saved in .rtf format, opened in WordPad - the story begins on the cover page in error

After all that hub bub, I finally submitted. To defeat, or as a participant, I dunno.
*smashes head on desk

I understand that those who receive manuscripts have little patience for poorly formatted manuscripts. But I hope to God the person on the receiving end reads my note that I wrote in the email, the one that read "Written in Open Office" so that in the spirit of that wisdom, they will open with that application, and not the cursed WordPad. Or I'm screwed.

Challenge Number 6

Awaiting further instructions.

As it happened, to enter this particular contest, one had to fill out a form on Google software, then click the Paypal button and wait for an email to send you instructions.
I waited.
Waited.
This was around 9:30ish at night. Fearing disqualification, I dispatched an email with those concerns.
I believe I got a message after midnight. They said I could send it before midnight the following day. Excellent. Luckily they did send me the right email to send off the entry to, and not the generic email on their website. (you thought it would be that easy? Uhn-uhn!) And a follow up 'thanks for participating' requisite email.
Ok.
I finally crashed from all the caffeine and the nerve-wracking race to the end.
Good luck to me I guess!
Zzzz...

 

 

My concern on entering any writing contest

Most of these contests, I have realized, give very tight deadlines. And that sucks ass. Hard to say with this one, as I found it very late in the game though. Please, do give writers a much longer window to send their talent in.

Who knows, one might discount on technicality that one amazing would-be award-winning writer based on some poorly formatted writing, not enough time to get the cash in for the contest fees, or some abrupt deadline, or whatever.

If the goal is to get your hands on this year's New York Time's Best Seller/ undiscovered talent, then make it easier for folks to submit their writings.

Not sure how others have fared, but I managed to find my manuscript template online. Otherwise, I would've been watching countless YouTube videos on how to construct a manuscript template by hand. And God help you if all of your formatted changes don't make it from page to page!


Make it easy on yourselves.Offer templates for free use on your websites. You can grab the analytics from each click/impression and use that aggregated data to further narrow your audience.

If you are asking for manuscripts, please be reasonable. 
Own various word processing software, in case folks send in their work formatted in that one bit of software you know your office doesn't carry. Average folks cannot purchase various licenses for different software. They will argue against going through the expense of buying writing software if they already own one. Even if it isn't the one that's pre-loaded onto your office computers.

If you have interns, have them tidy up the manuscript formatting if you don't want to read through a headache.

And don't give me that shit about, 'Well, if they really, really want to become an author'...because most people have no savings, and small kids to feed. These purchases then become frivolous to them. Don't be a dick! Goodbye to another future J.K. Rowling if you're not flexible on your requirements! Watta shame, watta shame.

What I have learned from entering a writing contest

If I have learned anything from this exercise, it's this:

1. Fork over the cash and get yourself the Scrivener software, which I understand formats perfectly
2. Enter a writing contest at least two weeks to deadline
3. Give yourself enough margin for error, because shit happens
4. Give yourself enough time, because we always change our minds, our words, our entire phrases...
5. Read through your entire writings, beginning to end. Give it a once-over, because even the most fastidious of grammar nazis will miss things
6. Don't bother entering a contest far too close to deadline, unless you already have something pre-written. You'll drive yourself needlessly crazy

Aside from the formatting headache, I am glad I entered. Hopefully they won't have issues reading my manuscript from issues stemming from software compatibility, or other computer crap. I do it for the experience, not necessarily for the win.

If any of you have had snafu's related to entering writing contests, feel free to discuss.