November: National Novel Writing Month
November is National Novel Writing Month! That means it's the perfect time to write, and enter your work into competitions that might get you noticed by an literary agent or editor. One of the easiest ways to get noticed is submitting some of your writing to seasonal twitter pitch contests. Entering these contests is a great way to network with agents, editors, and other writers in your genre.
If you've never entered a twitter pitch contest before, it's an event (usually lasting around 12 hours) where you are invited to pitch your manuscript right on Twitter using a specific hashtag. Agents are well aware of these contests, and follow them eagerly. If they like a pitch, they will favorite it, and that is your invitation to send them a query.
#PitMad is the most well-known and popular of these (and it happens four times a year). To enter, you must pitch your book using a total of 140 characters including the hashtag “#PitMad” and one or more category/genre tags such as:
- #PB = Picture Book
- #CB = Chapter Book
- #ER = Early Reader
- #MG = Middle Grade
- #YA = Young Adult
- #NA = New Adult
- #A = Adult
- #SFF = Science Fiction / Fantasy
- #UF = Urban Fantasy
- #CF = Contemporary Fantasy
- #HistFic/#HistFan = Historical Fiction / Historical Fantasy
- #R = Romance
- #Myst = Mystery
- #WF = Women’s Fiction
- #NF = Non-fiction
- #Mem = Memoir
- #LF = Literary Fiction
Here two upcoming pitch contests that are great to keep in mind while writing in November.
2017:
December 7: #PitMad
Twitter Pitch Party. 8am to 8pm EST; only 3 tweets allowed per project.
Details: http://www.brenda-drake.com/pitmad/
2018
January 18: Insecure Writer’s Group — #ISWGPit
Twitter Pitch Party. 8am to 8pm EST; 1 tweet allowed per hour.
Details: http://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/p/iwsg-twitter-pitch.html