Call for Entries!
“The 2013 Laine Cunningham Novel Award”
The Blotter’s Fourth Annual Long Form Fiction Contest for Novella and Novel length works
1. The purpose of our contest is to provide a venue for writers to have their work read and commented on by our editors and judges. Additionally, the winner of this contest will have his/her work published here on these pages. And last but not least, the winner will receive a monetary prize! (Award monies are provided by the prize sponsor and the entry fee for the contest helps offset The Blotter’s costs.)
2. Our pre-reader judges are intelligent and highly proud of their educations. Our final judge is smart, well-read and fiercely possessive of her personal space. She gets to be the final judge and as Pop says, “there are no ifs ands or buts about it.”
3. In a world besmirched by foolishness and scandal, transparency is very important to us, and we make every effort to eliminate any conflict of interest situation from going down in our contest. Blotter volunteers and their family members and/or employees are prohibited from entering our contest.
To enter the contest, please submit your work with a $25 entry fee by check or money order to: The Blotter Magazine, 1010 Hale Street, Durham, NC 27705. Entries must be received between November 1, 2012 and February 28, 2013 (you see, we’re already giving you an extension, so don’t put it off!)
Your entry must contain the following: no less than 10 pages and no more than 20 pages of the opening of your novel or novella, (or subject/character-connected short story chapbook) typed & double-spaced, without your name. On a separate cover page type your name, snail-mail and e-mail address, telephone number , the title of your novel or novella and a one page synopsis of your novel or novella. Remember, you have to have the entire book written, so that if and when you win, you can show us the rest! Sounds easy because it is!
BONUS: Enter the writing contest AND get a year’s subscription to The Blotter for only $30! (Regular annu- al subscription donationss are $25 total and you don’t even get to enter a writing contest with that price!)
Well, now. $650 in cash prizes, plus books and other fun stuff we’ve been accumulating around here that we think has value. All placements, including honorable mentions, will receive an award certificate, proof positive of your success as an author, suitable for mocking your sophomore English teacher, who always wondered how it was that you graduated at all.
Our contest will be run in line with the rules of ethics and mechanics recommended by the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses, as outlined in their 2006 monograph on the subject. You can’t view for free, but you may purchase the monograph entitled “Publishing Contests: Ethics and Mechanics” through the CLMP at http://www.clmp.org/about/monographs.html. This is the document we have used in coming up with the rules and conditions of this contest.
So that’s it, then - now get to work!