Here’s the timeline:
September 7: The submission windows open
September 21: Selected submissions announced
September 21-October 18: Mentoring takes place
October 19: Revised Twitter pitches posted; agents (and editors!) like their favorites
Submissions
Each like will count as a partial or full request based on the agents’ preferences. Agents will be able to review and like your pitches for a full 24 hours, at which point you’ll be allowed to submit your materials to all the agents who requested them. These likes represent serious interest in your project, so PLEASE DON’T ACCEPT AN OFFER OF REPRESENTATION BEFORE GIVING THE #PITCHME AGENTS AN OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE A COMPETING OFFER.
September 7: The submission windows open
September 21: Selected submissions announced
September 21-October 18: Mentoring takes place
October 19: Revised Twitter pitches posted; agents (and editors!) like their favorites
Submissions
To enter, your manuscript must meet two conditions. First, it must be COMPLETE, NEVER-PUBLISHED, AND READY TO QUERY, and second, it must be in one of the following genres:
PB fiction and nonfiction* (all genres)
MG fiction (all genres)
YA fiction (all genres)
Adult fiction (all genres, including commercial, literary, and/or upmarket but excluding erotica)
*I’ve asked PB author and two-time #TacoPitch winner Tara Shiroff to help me again!
PB fiction and nonfiction* (all genres)
MG fiction (all genres)
YA fiction (all genres)
Adult fiction (all genres, including commercial, literary, and/or upmarket but excluding erotica)
*I’ve asked PB author and two-time #TacoPitch winner Tara Shiroff to help me again!
1. All submissions must be sent to kvandolzer(at)gmail(dot)com and include A TWITTER PITCH, A QUERY, AND THE FIRST 250 WORDS of your manuscript. (PB author-illustrators are also encouraged to share links to their online portfolios.) You must paste these items IN THE BODY OF YOUR E-MAIL; otherwise, I'll disqualify it.
2. Please submit ONLY ONE PROJECT. If you submit multiple projects, I'll only consider the first.
3. It would also really help if you INCLUDE YOUR CATEGORY--PB, MG, YA, OR ADULT--SOMEWHERE IN YOUR SUBJECT LINE, but it's not a requirement.
4. THERE WILL BE TWO 30-MINUTE SUBMISSION WINDOWS to (try to) accommodate work schedules and international entrants. The first submission window opens on Wednesday, September 7, at 11:00 a.m. EDT and closes at 11:30 a.m. EDT. The second submission window opens later that same day, Wednesday, September 7, at 11:00 p.m. EDT and closes at 11:30 p.m. EDT. Hopefully, you'll be awake and/or not at work during one of these 30-minute intervals!
5. Once you send me your submission, I’ll send you a confirmation e-mail with a summary of these rules.
5. Once you send me your submission, I’ll send you a confirmation e-mail with a summary of these rules.
6. Previous finalists may enter again AS LONG AS THEY HAVE A NEW MANUSCRIPT TO SUBMIT.
Selections
I'll select 6 entries within each major category--PB, MG, YA, and adult--and up to 6 wildcards. I may pick 6 adults or 3 YAs and 3 MGs or just a single PB; it depends on what I know the agents are looking for and which submissions seem strongest.
Selections
I'll select 6 entries within each major category--PB, MG, YA, and adult--and up to 6 wildcards. I may pick 6 adults or 3 YAs and 3 MGs or just a single PB; it depends on what I know the agents are looking for and which submissions seem strongest.
Once I've finalized my picks--with Tara’s help, of course--I'll e-mail the winning writers and announce the winning titles here and/or on my Twitter feed on Wednesday, September 21. Then the real work will begin!
Mentoring
For the next roughly 4 weeks, the winning writers will revise their pitches, queries, and first pages with my and Tara’s help. You won’t be obligated to incorporate our thoughts, and the feedback we provide on your queries and first pages won’t actually be featured in the agent round itself. We just want to help you make your pitches, queries, and first pages the very best that they can be.
Mentoring
For the next roughly 4 weeks, the winning writers will revise their pitches, queries, and first pages with my and Tara’s help. You won’t be obligated to incorporate our thoughts, and the feedback we provide on your queries and first pages won’t actually be featured in the agent round itself. We just want to help you make your pitches, queries, and first pages the very best that they can be.
Liking
On Wednesday, October 19, I'll post the revised pitches ON MY TWITTER FEED for the agents (and editors!) to review. Here are the awesome agents who’ll be liking your pitches:
Aida Z. Lilly of KT Literary
Ali Lake of Janklow & Nesbit Associates
On Wednesday, October 19, I'll post the revised pitches ON MY TWITTER FEED for the agents (and editors!) to review. Here are the awesome agents who’ll be liking your pitches:
Aida Z. Lilly of KT Literary
Ali Lake of Janklow & Nesbit Associates
Elisa Houot of The Seymour Agency
Elizabeth Bewley of Sterling Lord Literistic
Jen Nadol of The Unter Agency
Jennifer Herrington of Harvey Klinger Literary Agency
Jon Cobb of HG Literary
Elizabeth Bewley of Sterling Lord Literistic
Jen Nadol of The Unter Agency
Jennifer Herrington of Harvey Klinger Literary Agency
Jon Cobb of HG Literary
Michael Carr of Veritas Literary Agency
Shari Maurer of Stringer Literary Agency
Stefanie Molina of Ladderbird Literary Agency
Shari Maurer of Stringer Literary Agency
Stefanie Molina of Ladderbird Literary Agency
Each like will count as a partial or full request based on the agents’ preferences. Agents will be able to review and like your pitches for a full 24 hours, at which point you’ll be allowed to submit your materials to all the agents who requested them. These likes represent serious interest in your project, so PLEASE DON’T ACCEPT AN OFFER OF REPRESENTATION BEFORE GIVING THE #PITCHME AGENTS AN OPPORTUNITY TO MAKE A COMPETING OFFER.
I've also enlisted the aid of some lurking editors. Their likes will also represent requests, BUT EVEN IF THEIR PUBLISHERS ALLOW YOU TO SUBMIT WITHOUT AN AGENT, I STRONGLY RECOMMEND THAT YOU WAIT UNTIL YOU SECURE REPRESENTATION. A smart, savvy agent is worth their weight in gold, and I'm hopeful agents will be even more interested in your project if they know you've got an editor request (or two!) in your back pocket.
So get those pitches polished up and plan to e-mail them to me--with your queries and first pages--on Wednesday, September 7, at 11:00 a.m. or 11:00 p.m. EDT. We can’t wait to read your work!
Have a question? Ask below!
Have a question? Ask below!
36 comments:
Hi Krista,
Rather than including just the text, can an author/illustrator post a link to the illustrated manuscript in their email submission (especially if the work is dependent on images)? No. 1 above says they can share links to their online portfolio. I'm wondering about a link to the manuscript.
Thanks for your help, Morissa
Good question, Morissa! If you've already fully illustrated your PB manuscript, it would be cool to see, but if you have a link, does that mean you've already published it digitally? If so, it wouldn't qualify for this contest, as all submissions must be never-published. What would the link be to?
A link would be to an illustrated mock-up/dummy, in PDF form. Something like this is still miles away from "published". Equivalent to exporting a .doc manuscript to pdf.
I wish I had a fully-ready manuscript so that I could participate. I've saved your list of agents so I can ask them about doing an agent spotlight interview at Literary Rambles in the future.
Thanks for this clarification, Anon. If that's the case, an author-illustrator could participate in #PitchMe and include that link (though it would still be helpful to have just the text pasted in the body of the submission e-mail). I just don't want anyone to be posting a fully illustrated picture book or even a dummy in an openly visible place online. Don't give away your intellectual property for free!
I'm sorry you won't be able to submit, Natalie, but I think these agents would make great editions to your series on Literary Rambles!
Exciting, thanks!
One question - do art notes count in the word count? I have about 10 words of art notes for my picture book opening that are critical for establishing the time period in the deep past. Thanks!
Thank you "Anonymous" (exactly) and Krista for your replies. So yes, not yet published and not public but a link to the illustrated manuscript pdf for your eyes and Tara's.
Looking forward to this, Krista! Just to clarify, even for picture book submissions, we should only submit the first 250 words, correct? Thank you!
Katie, at this stage, plan on including your illustration notes in the submitted word count. I know that isn't standard, but because I'll have dozens, maybe hundreds, of submissions to go through, I want to try to regulate the number of words I'll be reading at least a little:) That said, Tara and I will review full PB manuscripts for the finalists (and Tara may ask to see more as she's reviewing the submissions)!
Sounds good, Morissa. Good luck!
Thanks for clarifying, Andrew! Yes, even the PB writers should only submit the first 250 words at this stage (and as I mentioned above, if you want to include illustration notes, make sure you include them in your word count). Just trying to standardize the amount of reading I'll be doing!
Sounds good, thank you! Truly appreciate all of your hard work on this.
I’m literally shaking with anticipation. So flipping excited. Whoohoo!!
Hello! For the query letter, do you want it addressed to you and Tara, or do you want a non-personalized query? (Like our basic query letter that we would adapt for whichever agent we were sending it to. Hopefully my question makes sense ha ha.) Thanks! Excited for this!
I'm excited, too, Ryan:) Good luck!
Good question, Tinuviel! You can include personalization if you like, but it's by no means required. We just want to know what your book is about!
Ok, great. Thanks Krista! One more question (sorry to keep bugging you!). Our first page should be 250 words, (totally get that you need to keep the reading manageable, makes perfect sense) but is there any lee way? I'm at 256 ha ha and I've trimmed pretty much everything I can find to trim without sacrificing voice and things making sense. Is there a grace of a few words, or will we be disqualified? Thank you so much!
Thank you for this opportunity, can’t wait
Am I reading the times correctly on the submissions- First time is 11:00 and second time is the same, was there going to be 2 different times?
Thanks Krista I see we email you our submissions for 250 words. Those 250 words don’t get published online just the pitches correct?
Hi Krista,
Thanks you for this great opportunity! Do you accept chapter books?
Laurie
I'm not going to count words unless it's clearly more than 250, Tinuviel, so if you're a few over, that should be just fine!
There are two submission windows, Anon, one from 11:00 to 11:30 *a.m.* EDT and another from 11:00 to 11:30 *p.m.* EDT, so twelve hours apart. Hope that helps!
That's right, Claudine--only the Twitter pitches will get posted online. The query and first-page critiques are just to help out the finalists!
Good question, Laurie. Unfortunately, because far fewer agents are looking for chapter books, I haven't included them in #PitchMe. (Best of luck with yours, though!)
Awesome, thanks so much, Krista! And if I can manage to cut out those last few words for the sake of your reading load I totally will lol ;) Excited for the contest!
I'm curious whether you will accept Middle Grade graphic novel scripts.
We will accept MG graphic novel scripts, Sondra!
Should we include our prior experience in the query letter?
If the novel you’re pitching is considered a fantasy romance but has erotic elements, would this be something that isn’t considered?
Good question, Anon. I define erotica as sex scene after sex scene with no discernible plot, so if that's *not* your book, you're welcome to submit it. Hope that helps!
Hi Krista,
This is my first time seeing this. If I understand correctly, you just want the pitch (hook with summary, title, word count, genre) and the first 250 words of the manuscript - correct? My other question is must you have a twitter account to participate because you said to include A TWITTER PITCH.
Hi Krista,
Does "Ready to Query" include manuscripts that have been already sent out or are currently being queried? The manuscript I'm thinking of submitting has never been published, but it has been submitted for consideration somewhere.
Thanks for the clarification.
Morissa
It definitely does!! Looking forward to submitting ☺️
Thanks for your question, B W! You need to submit a Twitter pitch (280 characters), your regular query, and the first 250 words of your manuscript. For Twitter pitch inspiration, you might check out the links in this post: https://kristavandolzer.blogspot.com/2021/10/pitchme-results-and-wrap-up.html And you DON'T need to have a Twitter account to participate in this contest; I'll post the finalists' revised Twitter pitches on my feed on October 19.
Morissa, "ready to query" DOESN'T mean "never queried," so even if you've started querying, you can still participate in #PitchMe!
Good luck, Anon!
Hi Krista, do you accept submissions from different countries please? It sounds great, but I am based in England. Thanks
Thanks for your question, Anon. We absolutely accept international submissions, so hopefully, you'll be awake during at least one of the two submission windows! :)
Should we include our name on the query or not?
Would an early reader/lower MG graphic novel have a place here?
Thank you for this wonderful opportunity!
Hi Krista, I'm based in the Uk and caught wind of this a bit late. I've sent in my submission. Unfortunately, I think I missed the window cause of work. Will this still be accepted? Keeping all fingers crossed.
My apologies for not seeing these questions sooner, everyone! Marla, we're pretty flexible, so you can decide what to include in your signature block. (Case in point: lots of people didn't even include a signature block.)
Yari, we don't take chapter books, but if you think your project can be classified as MG, you're always welcome to submit it.
Marve, I'm afraid I can't accept submissions sent outside of the previously stated submission windows, but keep an eye on this space, as we'll almost certainly do #PitchMe again next year!
Post a Comment