Friday, February 25, 2011

*Victory Dance*

Hello, citizens of Blogger world!

So, I have two great pieces of news.

1) I finished writing Unraveling on Wednesday night. Woot woot! It's my shortest novel so far––a little under 70,000 words. But my ninja-writers love it, and I'm pretty happy with it. So, it's taken me 18 years and 8 novels, but I've finally written a realistic fiction book. IT'S A MIRACLE!

2) The second round of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest was announced yesterday. And I made the top 1000 in the Young Adult category with my novel Edge! *releases a long breath* So, I got through round one––in which my pitch was judged. Next comes the excerpt round, which I'm more nervous about. This is what happens, according to the rules:

Between February 24, 2011 and March 13, 2011, our expert reviewers, including Amazon editors and at least one Amazon Top Reviewer, will review and judge the Excerpts of each second round Entry. The expert reviewers rate each Excerpt on a scale of 1 to 5 on each of the following criteria:

a) Overall Strength of Excerpt
b) Prose/Style
c) Plot/Hook
d) Originality of Idea

*bites nails* Well, last year I made it through this round (and the round after it), but this is a totally different story so ... we'll see! Wish me luck!


As a random side-note that's not very exciting at all ... I've actually started to use my Twitter account. So if you have one, let me know! (I'm @BrigidRose)

The Quarterfinals of ABNA are announced on March 22nd, so I'll update then! In the meantime I'll have to choose some other project to work on. Luckily I have a bunch of unfinished stories to choose from. Urgh. And I'll probably do some other posts, although I'll have to come up with ideas ... Any suggestions? :)

11 comments:

  1. Congrats on making it to the next round... that's a real accomplishment. They get a ton of entries.

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  2. Congrats on making the cut. My advice is keep yourself busy with something else and try not to stress too much about the contest. No matter what happens in the next rounds you will now get a little feedback from the judges. Keep up your writing and good luck in ABNA.

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  3. I've already said this (or, rather, caps-lock-shouted it ;D) a million times, but CONGRATULATIONS ON FINISHING UNRAVELING, BRIGID. (Yes, I can never do that enough). It was so genius and beautiful and amazing and just the best novel I've ever read. <3 I love how your best novel is your first realistic fiction one. That's really cool. And congratulations on finally writing a RF book. :) I still haven't finished a realistic fiction book, so you're one step ahead of me, as always. (Then again, you've finished 8 novels and I've finished 2, so you're a bit more than just one step ahead of me. Dammit. :P)

    And congratulations about ABNA! You're going to do fine. Just don't think about it. You should edit Walking Shadow or write Rage or whatever you do and concetrate on that, like Bardmaid said. I wasn't stressing or worrying about the ABNA results for Round One because I've had so much on my plate and been so busy since ABNA started, and that actually helped.

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  4. Bardmaid - Thank you! Yes, that's exactly what I'm trying to do. :) And that's true––I look forward to getting feedback on my excerpt!

    Sella - Bahaha. Thanks! :) Yeah, and I'm also two years older than you ... so you have plenty of time to catch up! Congrats to you, too! *claps* Yeah ... I'm actually getting ideas for Sweet Sorrow. We must discuss. Although the last thing I need is a new story. Arrrgh!

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  5. *CLAPS FOR BRIGID!* yeah so glad you made it into the next round. I'm sure you'll do just fine!

    Darn it Bridid all this talk of how much your crit. partners are lovin' your novel is making me jealous! You need to get it published so that I can read it! ERRRG i am jealous. I know I said that before but I say it again only because I am doubly jealous! haha

    Anyway, as far as post ideas go, how about one on your editing process? I always find it interesting to see how others go about the task.

    Good luck, and relax, you'll do fantastic!

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  6. Hi Brigid. Congratulations! I really hope you do well with Edge, I'll be excited to hear how you do!

    My suggestions...hmm. Most of these are about a blogger who hasn't finished a novel yet. So...

    1. How do you deal with the times when you just want to give up, crawl into bed and eat Cheetos because you won't ever finish this novel/project? Have this ever happened to you? If not, how did you stop it from happening, or was it just by chance that you never experienced this?

    2. I've been working on this novel idea but a new one just sprung into my head. It's not as developed as my original idea, but I'm really excited about it. How do you get out of the cycle of this happening again and again?

    3. If you talk to parents/teachers/friends about writing novels, have you ever experianced the "Oh, good for you!" kind of reaction, when it's plain in their faces that they don't believe you're any good, based on your age? You're older by now, but did you deal with this when you were young?

    That's about it. I wish you the best of luck!

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  7. Ally - Thanks! :D

    lol! Well, I can email it to you if you want to read it! :)

    Oh! I did a post about editing a few months ago: http://mylifeasateenagenovelist.blogspot.com/2010/07/wonderful-post-on-editing.html

    D'awww thank you! :)

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  8. Cara - Thank you! Hmm, excellent questions. I could probably dedicate an entire post to answering those. :D

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  9. WOW! Great job! Good luck on the next round I'm sure you'll do great! BTW I love your blog!

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  10. Yay! Good luck! New follower from Goodreads. :)

    Best,

    Dana @ zombiegirlshambling.blogspot.com

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