The shortlist of the Novel Fair competition was announced last night, and, unfortunately, I wasn’t on it. I had no expectation that I would be, given the calibre of entrant I was up against, but it was wonderful to get as far as I did. Being longlisted for a writing prize, on my first time out, has given me a great boost.
So.
What now?
Well, I’ve joined ‘Authonomy’, and some of my WiP will be posted there in the coming days in an attempt to gain some feedback and (hopefully helpful!) critical opinion. I’ll put some up here on the blog, too, in order to give those who don’t use Authonomy a chance, should they wish for one, to have a look at what I’ve been working on. I’m already nearly 30,000 words into an entirely new WiP, so I’m going to bring that one to completion before I revisit ‘Tider’, and try to get it ship-shape and ready for submission to agents and publishers.
And if all that fails, well – we’ll see.
Wish me luck! And thank you for being such stalwart supports on the journey so far. I hope you’ll all be with me as I take the next steps towards achieving my life-long goal of seeing my work in print.
Happy Saturday! I’m looking forward to having a day off from writing, actually. My husband and I are off to visit one of our best friends and her brand-new baby girl, so we’re extremely excited about that. Writing will take over my life again from Monday – hope to see you there.
It’s Off to Work I’ll Go!
Image: arenaconsulting.net
SJ O'Hart 
Well done on getting so far – we are all proud of you. Good luck with the new “WiP”, now that I know what that stands for.
Thanks, Gretta – and sorry for the careless use of acronyms. 🙂 I should put a glossary on the blog somewhere to avoid confusion… 😀 xxx
Wishing you luck.
…and also thinking that a nice day off spent doing something like you are planning to do is ‘real life.’
Cheers!
Thank you for the luck! I hope you had a lovely weekend, and that life is good.
Take care!
Looking forward to reading more of your work. Well done with getting longlisted, it must be hard for the judges to choose between so much talent. *hugs* 🙂
Thank you! *accepts hugs gratefully* I’ll hopefully be updating the blog over the next day or two with excerpts from the current WiPs. Stay tuned! 🙂
I love your attitude, and the good thing is that when you get your first novel published you’ll have book 2 waiting in the wings. Keep going!
Thank you! Not only for the kind comment, but also the positive thinking. I’m definitely going to keep going, and I hope you’re getting on well with your own work. Thank you for the encouragement!
As I said on Twitter, this is a great achievement and will stand to you on your next round of submissions – and really that’s the thing that’s important. I don’t usually read the genre but will definitely make an exception for Tider when it comes out. (Great title, btw.)
Thanks for your Tweets, and also for this comment. I like the title ‘Tider’, too – it was sort of a ‘bolt from the blue’ moment for me! And I’m particularly honoured that you’d step into the murky waters of YA just to read my ‘umble little book. 😉 I hope it will, one day, be available to read, ideally between covers and for sale in a shop! *dreams*
But that’s not Tider, that’s another one, right? You are keeping Tider close to your heart and I understand that. The girl you have playing the main character looks beautiful.
Thanks – the actress is certainly beautiful, and was always the face I had in mind when writing the character of Maraika. She’ll probably be drawing the pension by the time the book gets published, though. 🙂