Writing Contests

Over the last few months I’ve had the privilege of judging a few writing contests, some for published authors and others for unpublished authors. I had the preconceived notion that the quality and talent of published authors would be more consistent and even than those who aren’t published.

Hah! Another myth buried under tons of concrete. The best work I read, and I judged over twenty-one different entries, came from an unpublished author. Quirky, hilarious, romantic tension popping every page, the characters, particularly the heroine, so easy to relate to, complex, flawed, admirable, I can’t wait to read the final version.

I read entries with obvious spelling and grammatical errors. One where people start talking to a character in an empty bar(and no, they weren’t ghosts nor was he schizoid). Another where from paragraph to paragraph, I couldn’t figure if we were in the past, present or future, as the character’s age ranged from seven to nineteen to forty-five in less than twenty lines. One I had to force myself to finish. One where I read those wonderful words, “The end,” and I still didn’t understand what had happened.

If you have a dream of being author, wouldn’t you want to be the best?
If you dream of winning a writing contest, wouldn’t you want to make your entry perfect, polished?

All of the entries had to be in either .rtf or word format. So, I’m assuming most were written in Word, WordPerfect, or some other word processing program. I don’t know of any version of any word processing program that doesn’t have a spell or grammatical checker.

Why would anyone entering a writing contest not run spell check? And I’m not talking about one or two entries, no more like five or six. Of course, if spell check wasn’t run, the grammatical checker wasn’t either.

I volunteer to judge because contests helped so much in my career. I try to be as detailed, but as kind as possible in my comments. I try to balance my, hopefully, constructive criticisms with praise where due.

I can only begin to imagine what editors receive on a daily basis. Even if a work is not wonderful, but the author has taken the time to polish her words, learn grammar, I can enjoy reading the entry. It really ticks me off though when people are too lazy to even re-read their own words.

You wouldn’t expect to get a job with a resume filled with spelling and grammar errors, would you?

I just don’t get it.

I do love it when I discover a new writer whose voice and work I love. And I uncovered seven beauties this year. Authors I am adding to my To Be Read list (not that it isn’t growing like Medusa’s head minute by minute).

I hope no one interprets this as ranting. I just think when someone submits an entry to a contest they should do their homework. And I also believe when a publishing house allows its standards to slip, we all lose as authors.

I bless the fact I found Loose-Id. And Georgia (Georgia Woods, my editor) - you’re a gem!

Have a great rest of the week,

Jiannne