Submission Details and Guidelines

The competition is open to all.

If you’ve got something riveting in your writing – perhaps wildly funny, or very important  – then send in up to 3000 words of the opening pages of your novel, and tell us about the rest.

Short story collections will be looked at with great attention, too. If you write with great style, and you’ve got something quirky, thoughtful and imaginative in your work – if your stories grip and display variety (think: Ness’s “Topics About Which We Know Nothing”), you can be wildly successful. But bear in mind that exciting stories, written ‘plainly’, can be even more popular. You don’t necessarily need to be a great stylist.

The 2006 competition is open to anything except poetry, which we regret that we are not equipped to consider this year.

Mystery and suspense writing is especially popular with us, and since we believe that all writing that succeeds in publishing makes ruthless use of mystery and suspense techniques, this means we are open to the whole gamut. Fiction and non-fiction (if you’ve written a book about your fall down Mount Everest, that’s fine – but make sure you don’t tell us you are fine now, thanks! on the first page. We want to be kept in suspense.)

Right now, at this very moment, books are being sold all over the world. But it’s more vital than ever these days to get off to an intriguing start. And that start is what we will be looking for. Whether it’s because of your characters, atmosphere, off-beat ideas, humour or storyline – if we are caught up at once in your book ourselves, from page one, we know it will appeal to the reading public.

So there you have it. All a submission has to do is grip our attention. If it does that, we’ll be adding it to our file for serious consideration.

Together with your entry, we will be asking for a brief summary of the rest of the book – tell us what we need to know, as clearly and stylishly and professionally as you can, but keep it short (100 to 500 words). Remember that when we see the category, theme/genre of your work, we will be selecting the appropriate readers to send it out to. So be clear.

The competition will be judged by The Fiction Witch, Good Fairy, and by associated professionals in the publishing business.

Time constraints would make further feedback from the manuscript readers, and Fiction Witch and Good Fairy, impossible, so we regret to have to advise that no correspondence can be entered into and the judges’ decision is, of course, final.

The Rewards

Every writer entering this competition will receive feedback, this time consisting of a summary (a three page report on the entry) from Fiction Witch together with Good Fairy, as well as sets of impressions and comments from several (depending on the genre and who is available)  manuscript readers. A full set of tips, advice, suggestions about writing, submission, promotion and presentation will also be sent to each entrant from Fiction Witch and Good Fairy, and this will be geared to apply as widely as possible.

We aim to have feedback returned to entrants within two weeks, but ask for some leeway, as with so many readers extra time may occasionally be needed.

Long listed entrants will get detailed feedback in the form of a line edit with comments and advice from Good Fairy on the manuscript, and a line edit and comments and advice from Fiction Witch on the synopsis.

(Fiction Witch: Straight to the point, clear – with a sharp eye for details and acerbic wit. An expert in fiction, knows the market backwards, can be demanding but responds to different styles and voices and gets very excited when talent rears its head – and says so.
Always comes up with informed, inspired, immensely practical advice.

Good Fairy: Seeks potential, draws out it out, responds to whimsy, warmth and humour. Senses intentions and is able to suggest the best methods for bringing a writer along. Infinitely patient and enthusiastic. Has had a lot of success (many writers worked with have won awards).)

All short listed entrants will be invited to submit their finished manuscript to the UKA Press to be considered for publication.

The winning entry will be published (following completion of the manuscript and editing support from the UKA Press) with The UKA Press.

Importantly, all short listed entries will be put into print. They will be published and given special display in the UKA Press 2007 'Voices from the Web' print Anthology, with an introduction on the cover of the book, as well as on Amazon (and many other online bookstores), along with a brief biography of the author and promotional introduction inside the book. Readers’ and judges’ commendations will be included in the book.

All this is carefully designed to promote the winning authors’ work – to get them noticed and up and out of the slush pile.

Competition Guidelines

The competition is open to anyone, writing in any genre.

No particular style is required. You can write as simply or as experimentally as you like.

Just remember that the judges will be looking for entries that have a spark about them – something intriguing.