Here’s a couple of items of market information I thought were well worth sharing: a competition for unpublished manuscripts from Australia and New Zealand, and submission details for the next issue of Landfall: the Music issue, to be edited by Bill Direen.
Part 1: IP Picks
Interactive Press (IP), the publishers of Voyagers: Science Fiction Poetry from New Zealand, hold an annual competition for unpublished manuscripts in five categories. This year, the competition is open to New Zealanders as well as Australians.
The basic details are below. For more, including details of the winners from 2009 and previous years, and the download links for the entry form etc, please see IP Picks.
IP Picks: Writing Competition for Unpublished Manuscripts
Now looking ahead to its ninth year in 2010 the IP Picks Awards provide guaranteed royalty publication to the best book-length manuscript in five categories: Best Fiction, Best Creative Non-fiction, Best Poetry, Best Junior Fiction or Non-fiction, Best First Book.
First Place Winners of each category are awarded pulication. Highly Commended entrants are given a short reader’s report valued at $249, offering editorial advice on how to improve the manuscript. Commended entrants will receive a summary of the judging panel’s report on their entries. There is no guarantee of publication for Highly Commended or Commended entrants.
The competition is open to citizens and residents of Australia and New Zealand.
The Fiction category is for manuscripts up to 80,000 words and can include short story collections, short novels and novels written for young adults and/or adults. Any form of fiction is eligible, including science fiction and fantasy. [TJ’s emphasis]
The Creative Non-fiction category is also for manuscripts up to 80,000 words based on real-life experience and research, but written with literary flair. Biographies, memoirs, travel literature, histories, creative non-fiction for young adults and inspirational self-help books are examples.
New this year, the Junior Fiction and Non-fiction category seeks manuscripts up to 60,000 words. Novels or creative non-fiction works intended for audiences twelve and under are welcome. Picture books are not eligible.
The Poetry category is for complete collections in any sub-genre, including verse novels, verse plays, special forms such as haiku, or a a mixture of forms.
The Best First Book can be in any genre (Young Adult and older), but the author must not have previously had a book-length manuscript (48 A5 pages or longer) published by a recognised national publisher. Authors who have self-published with only local distribution are eligible to enter under this category. There is no age restriction, but if you are under eighteen years of age, you must have a parent or carer co-sign your entry form.
You may enter a single manuscript in two categories, but you have to pay two entry fees.
How Is It Judged?
IP Picks entries are adjudicated in-house by our Editorial Board.
Each entry is blind read by at least two judges. The judges first form a long-list of entries through a ranking system adjudicated by our genre editors. Next, the Board compares entries on their lists and compiles a short list from the rankings. The short-listed entries are read again by the Board, which, at that stage, includes the Director. Finally the Board meets to decide the winners and commended entries. At that meeting, the Board may also recommend that the Director offer publication to certain of the commended entries.
We then contact the winners and commended entrants and post the results on our website in IP eNews, our online newsletter, as well as circulating the results to all State writers centres.
Deadlines and Fees
IP Picks opens on 1 October and closes on 1 December each year. Entry packages must include:
– two printed copies and one digital (on CD or floppy disk) copy of the entry (if you are entering in more than one category, you only need to submit two printed copies and one digital copy to cover both categories).
– a completed entry form – type or print in block letters
– the applicable fee
Download the required Conditions and Entry form in Word format or as a pdf file for further details on the submission procedure and to enter the competition. If you have trouble downloading the form [Adobe Acrobat Reader® required], email us for a copy, or send a self-addressed stamped envelope to IP, Treetop Studio, 9 Kuhler Court, Carindale 4152.
We charge a reading fee, currently set at $66 per entry. This must be included as a cheque or money order, with your entry. Included in the reading fee is an IP title of your choice. If you enter more than one category, you must pay a fee for each entry, and for that you receive an extra title of your choice.
At the time of submission you may also ask to have a short report written on the publishability of your manuscript. The fee for that report is $199 GST-inclusive, or $169 for students or concession card holders (must provide photocopy of student card or concession card).
Part 2: Landfall Sings
Landfall 219
The NZ Music Issue
Guest edited by Bill Direen
New Zealand music has been made with electric guitars, European orchestral instruments, laptops, bones, voices, skin, wood, pvc piping, air, magnetic tape and digital media. For this special Music issue, the editor is seeking work that demonstrates the essential cultural value of music and ways of making it in New Zealand. The musical aspect of poetry – phrasing, timing and the insinuation of meaning during performance – is an aspect that creative writers might respond to. Musical aspects of prose – alliterative and rhythmical or structural devices – may carry meaning quite as much as syntactical ones. Also sought are publications on New Zealand music for review, reviews of performances and readings, and writings related to the experience of listening, and especially writing that may consider the role of NZ music and ways of making it in a wider context.
Bill Direen grew up in the sixties surrounded by music and poetry of all sorts, classical, cultural, liturgical, radio pop and solid state rock. He studied electronic music under Douglas Lilburn before concentrating on literature (M.A. Hons, Canterbury University) and developing an independent career as writer and musician.
Landfall 219 will be published May 2010. Submission deadline: January 10 2010. Submissions to: Landfall, Otago University Press, PO Box 56, Dunedin, New Zealand. Email correspondence (no submissions, please) to: landfall (at) otago.ac.nz
