With a publishing contract from Amazon Publishing and a $50,000 advance at stake for the
2013 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award (January (9
th-27
th), that
alone should entice 10,000 writers from the far flung corners of the globe,
including Borneo where I call home.
Unlike
previous years, there are now five categories: General Fiction, Mystery/Thriller,
Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror, Romance, and Young Adult Fiction.
Last year my novel
The Resurrection of Jonathan Brady was a
Quarter-finalist; however, I enter the competition for the six lessons that I’ve learned.
Lesson
1: No matter how good your novel is, it won’t get read if your pitch is ineffective. The first round of judging by Amazon-selected editors—whereby 80% of
the competition gets cut—is based solely on that 300-word pitch. Use those 300-words wisely; every word has to
count, and pack as much punch as you can.
You will not get a second chance.
This also applies to when you’re pitching your novel to agents/publishers.
If the pitch doesn’t entice them, they will quickly delete and move onto the
next query.
They
don’t have time to think, ok the pitch is fairly general, the plot a bit
vague, but let me read the novel—maybe the writing is great. It’s the opposite, if the pitch is weak,
there’s a great chance the novel is weak, too.
Instead of complaining about this, accept it and make darn sure your
pitch is good! Your novel deserves to be
read.
The
top 400 novels from each category will advance.
Lesson
2: Ok, your pitch got you through to Round 2, which will be judged by Amazon Expert Reviewers. Congrats.
But despite how brilliant your pitch is, and how great the premise of
your novel is, if you fail to deliver the goods in the first 3,000-5,000 word
excerpt, you’re out of luck. Also agents/publishers
often look at only the opening five pages or the first chapter (even when they request three chapters). If those opening pages don’t grab their interest or if they see too many
red flags (grammar mistakes such as verb tense problems, style mistakes like
relying on trite expressions and clichés, or point of view problems) they will stop
reading.
So
put extra time into those early chapters or the rest of your novel may not get
read. Good questions to ask yourself: Are you starting the novel in the most
effective place? Is there too much
backstory and not enough forward momentum? Is this the best viewpoint character for your
story? Could changing it to present or
past tense improve it? Can you make your
writing style or the plot more compelling?
What other changes can you make to improve your manuscript? The more questions you ask yourself, the more likely you'll find the answers.
The
top 100 novels from each category will advance.
Lesson
3: The Quarter-finals is judged on the
full manuscript by reviewers from Publishers
Weekly. Never assume that your novel
is good enough to enter, let alone good enough to win. I’m always surprised when I take out my novel
and read it out loud with fresh eyes and fresh ears . . . . I often catch stuff that I
previously overlooked or find a better way of saying something or find words
(usually adjectives and adverbs) that detract more than they add, or stuff I can cut. I also look at the pacing, the paragraphing, and
the dialogue.
I
look at the logic, too. Why would a
character logically say or do something in that situation? Are their motives or backstories clear? The more times I go through each chapter
before moving on to the next chapter, the more ways I find to improve it. Remember, there are a lot of well written
books and great story ideas that your book is competing against. Having been a judge before, I know that judging is subjective. Some may love your novel; others make dismiss
it for a dozen valid reasons.
Only
five novels from each category will advance.
Lesson
4: The Semi-finals is judged by the
editors with Amazon Publishing. At this
level all the books are probably deserving publication, so how does yours
stack up to the others? If there is any room
to improve your book, take the initiative to do so before you enter. Keep asking yourself questions about your
characters, the minor ones, too (do they really add to the scene or detract
from it by being bland or predictable?)
Are they memorable? Do others care
about them? When it comes right down to
it, your story is about people (even non-humans) doing something. Do we like or care about them? Do we like or care about what they are doing?
Sometimes a small change can make a big difference how people react to your novel—like the title. Will it prick a reader’s interest the first time they hear it or see it mentioned somewhere? Is
it too literary, too cryptic, too vague, or does it immediately resonate with the reader, even tell them
what the book is about? The Hunger Games, for example, raises many
questions on different levels. You’re intrigued,
thinking, what’s this hunger about? Yet you know it’s going to involve a competition.
Run
your title by your friends and have them rate it on a scale of 1-5. Maybe you’re thinking one thing, but it makes
them think of something totally different, possibly a turn-off, too. Then brainstorm for an even better
title.
Another novel of mine that made it to Round Two in 2011, I did exactly that this year; I changed the title from A Gun for Christmas to An Unexpected
Gift from a Growling Fool. I also changed the name of the town from Sharpton to Growling
where the story is set, hoping to make the title a little more intriguing. That then caused me to add a whole new first
paragraph, an anecdote about how the town got its unusual name, thus setting the mood for
the opening chapter. Each change, I’ve
learned, can have a ripple effect.
Only
one novel in each category will advance to the final
Lesson
Five: The Finals will be judged by
Amazon customers based on that 3,000-5,000 excerpt again. Again if the beginning of your book doesn’t
pull the reader into the story and make them care about the characters and what
the characters are trying to do, they will never know about your great ending, read your other great scenes, meet all of your unforgettable characters, or be swept
away by your incredible plot.
Once
I upload my pitch, excerpt, and manuscript, I take a deep breath. I'm in. But then each day I keep revising that pitch, that
excerpt, and that novel right up until the competition closes. I'm not taking any chances. Any one of those three could prevent my novel
from advancing. All of them are critical
to its success.
Lesson
Six: Preparing for the Amazon
Breakthrough Novel Award is not only a great way to end the year by revising my
novels (I usually start by mid-November or early December), but also a great
way to start the New Year by being pro-active in my career. Even
if my novel fails to win in Amazon or even advance beyond the First Round, I know
that the extra work I put into it has vastly improved my chances to land that
agent or do well in another competition.
It sure worked last year, when two of my novels made the finals of the
2012 Faulkner-Wisdom Competition and a third was a short-list finalist.
More importantly, revising my novel also gives me hope that this year will be the year of the novel. Hope is a good thing to have for all writers,
especially those like me who live in the far-flung corners of the world.
*Update:
The five finalist.
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
