”Dear Lucky Agent” Contest: Memoir and Narrative Nonfiction

Note from Chuck: It's Feb. 1, 2010, which means this contest
is now closed. Thank you for entering. Winners
should be announced within 7 days or so.
Meanwhile, our next contest should start
within a week or two, as well. It's for writers
of kids books!

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"Dear Lucky Agent" Contest:

Memoir and Narrative Nonfiction

Welcome to the first "Dear Lucky Agent" Contest on the GLA blog. This will be a recurring online contest with agent judges and super-cool prizes. Here's the deal: With every contest, the details are essentially the same, but the niche itself changes - meaning each contest is focused around a specific category or two. So if you're writing book-length memoir or narrative nonfiction, this first contest is for you!

HOW TO SUBMIT

You can leave your entry in the Comments section of this post, or just e-mail it. Send e-mailed entries to januaryagentcontest@gmail.com. (If using e-mail, paste everything. No attachments.)

WHAT TO SUBMIT

The first 200 words of your unpublished, book-length work of memoir, femoir or narrative nonfiction (also called creative nonfiction). You must include a contact e-mail address with your entry and use your real name. Though not mandatory, feel free to submit the title of the work and a logline (one-sentence description of the work) with your entry.

Please note: To be eligible to submit, I ask that you do one of two things: 1) Mention and link to this contest twice through any social media - blogs, Twitter, Facebook, forums, message boards, comments on other blog sites; or 2) just mention this contest once and also add Guide to Literary Agents Blog (www.guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog) to your blogroll. Please provide link(s) so I can verify eligibility.

CONTEST DETAILS

1. This contest will be live for approximately twelve days - from Jan. 19 through the end of Sunday, Jan. 31, EST. Winners notified by e-mail within seven days of end of contest. Winners announced on the blog thereafter.
2.To enter, submit the first 150-200 words of your book. Shorter or longer entries will not be considered. Keep it within word count range please.
3.This contest is solely for completed book-length works of memoir (life stories), femoir, narrative nonfiction or creative nonfiction. Stories, naturally, must be true - not simply fiction based on truth.
4.You can submit as many times as you wish. 
5.The contest is open to everyone of all ages, save those employees, officers and directors of GLA's publisher, F+W Media.
6. There are more rules (most of them dealing with legal stuff) that you can find in the comments section of this post. 
7. By commenting on this post or e-mailing your story, you are submitting an entry for consideration in this contest and thereby agreeing to the terms written here as well as the terms added by me at the beginning of the "Comments" section of this blog post.

PRIZES!!!

First place: 1) A critique of 25 pages of your work, by your agent judge. 2) Two free books from Writer's Digest Books (I will give you several choices and you pick the books your want).

Runner-ups - second and third place: 1) A critique of 10 pages of your work, by your agent judge. 2) One free book from Writer's Digest Books (I will give you several choices and you pick the book your want).

MEET YOUR (AWESOME) JUDGE!

Katharine Sands is an agent with the Sarah Jane Freymann Literary Agency. She is the agent provocateur for Making the Perfect Pitch: How to Catch a Literary Agent's Eye. Books she's repped include:

SAT Word Slam, by Jodi Fodor

Hands Off My Belly: The Pregnant Woman's Survival Guide to Myths, Mothers and Moods, by Shawn Tassone and Kathryn Landherr

The Complete Book of International Adoption: A Step-by-Step Guide to Finding Your Child, by Dawn Davenport

Taxpertise: The Complete Book of Dirty Little Secrets and Tax Deductions for Small Businesses the IRS Doesn't Want You to Know, by Bonnie Lee