An Unexpected Gift from a Growling Fool was
named short-list finalist in the novel category for the 2013 Faulkner-Wisdom
Competition. There were 362 entries from
37 US states and seven foreign countries.
Last year, A Perfect Day for an Expat Exit was one of the finalists and The Resurrection of Jonathan Brady was a short-list finalist for the second
year running. I’m still waiting to hear
the results for the Novel-in Progress category, where The Girl in the Bathtub
was a finalist last year, and from the Novella category where I entered for the
first time, The Act of Theft.
So that’s four novels that have made the
finals or short-list finals in 2012 and 2013 Faulkner-Wisdom Competition in the
novel and novel-in-progress categories. Not
bad. A fifth book has a chance in the
Novella category.
Before entering this year, I revamped my
novels and read them out loud, a good way to catch mistakes and sharpen the
writing, something I recently blogged about.
Still, there is a
lot of competition out there from all those in master degree writing programs and literature majors that have a leg up on the rest of us. It sure helps to have someone, other than
yourself, pushing you to raise your writing standards and your storylines. That’s what I did for years for my writing
students and those whom I edit. When
living in Penang, where two of my novels are set, I exchanged work with other
writers, and did a little of that over here in Borneo with the opening pages. Perhaps it’s high time I start doing that
again.
* Update: The Girl in the Bathtub also named short-list finalist for novel-in-progress (Gift from the Past)
and Act of Theft, shortlist finalist for the novella, so five books into two years!
Here are links to some
of my author-to-author interviews of first novelists:
Ivy
Ngeow author of Cry
of the Flying Rhino, winner
of the 2016 Proverse Prize.
Plus:
Beheaded on
Road to Nationhood: Sarawak Reclaimed—Part
I
2 comments:
Good to hear of a novel set in Borneo. Cheers!
Thanks, but Unexpected Gift is set in the US. I do plan to write a Borneo novel, though still finishing up prior ideas set in Penang where i lived for 20 years. All the best.
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