Writing Competitions and Opportunities (Free to Enter) Round-Up: September 2017 Edition

1. Short story competition with Juggernaut and Death of the Author 

You need to enter your contact details on this form, email your story (2000-8000 words on any theme)  to contest@juggernaut.in with the subject line: WRITERS’ SALON.  The winner gets a contract with Juggernaut Books. More details on the link. The last date for submission is 15 October 2017.

2.  DWL Short Story Contest 2017 

Email your short story entry(based on any theme with word count of up to 5000 words) to info@desiwriterslounge.net only as a Microsoft Word (.doc or .docx) attachment. The top three entries for the contest will win $100 each and one of the top 3 stories will also receive the Dastaan Award.  The Submissions deadline is 30 September 2017. For further details visit the link.

 

All the best!

 

Writing Competitions and Opportunities (Free to Enter) Round-Up: July 2017 Edition

From time to time, we’ll be doing round-ups of competitions that are free to enter and that Indian writers are eligible to participate in. This is our first list for 2017.

1. TOI Write India Season 2 Contest 2017: Times of India

Write India is a Short Story Contest initiative by Times Internet that offers prompts from 11 of India’s top-selling authors.  Every month a winner is selected from the entries received with the help of the ‘Celebrity Author of the Month’. Please go through the faqs in detail. A book will be published with all the top winning entries.  The competition starts on the 7th of every month till the 30th of the month.

2. James Hemingway Short Fiction Award-2017

James Hemingway is one of the first publishing imprints under the umbrella of Shreem Info Media. SIM Publishing has launched a short fiction prize aimed at finding genuine Indian voices. The award is open to stories written in both English and Hindi languages. Previously published stories are welcome too.  The first prize winner will get a fixed cash award (to be announced) along with the submitted entry published in a book on the theme with other nominations and released worldwide. Twenty-one best stories will be nominated for the award. These twenty-one stories will be published in the book form by SIM publishing and launched worldwide. All nominated stories will be translated into English(if Hindi stories are selected). This year’s theme is ‘Delhi’. Deadline is at midnight 22nd July 2017. There is a late fee of INR 250 for all submissions after the deadline. The word limit for Hindi is 4500 and for English is 3500. Please go through the rules on the website.

3. Monsoon – My Article Contest

Looking for write-ups on Monsoon memory, recipes, etc. Email write-up at halfsamosa@99colours.com with your full name. Mention the contest category(mentioned in the link) and a title for your write-up. Your write- up should be at least 300 words long and it should be in MS Word only.You can send more than one article. Contest closes on 31st July 2017. The winners will be judged on the basis of Facebook likes (50%) and on the quality of the write-up/entry (50%). The winner will be announced by email on 10th August 2017. The best two winners will be awarded Flipkart gift vouchers of Rs. 500/- each. Articles will be accepted in both English and Bengali.

4. The Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction

Comma Press and the University of Central Lancashire have announced the first annual Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction. The theme for this inaugural year will be ‘Café Stories’, in honor of Dinesh’s Café Shorts series which he posted on his blog. He believed cafes to be “fertile ground for the short story.” The prize is open to anyone 18 years or over, and the story you submit must not have been published anywhere else, online or in print. It is free to submit your entry, but only one per writer. All entries will be made anonymous upon receipt. Entries will be made anonymous upon receipt and will remain so until after the shortlist has been decided. Entries open 10th May 2017 and close 31st October 2017. All entries must include a cover letter which states the author’s name, address, email, contact number, and story title. Any entries sent without this information will not be considered. You must submit your story both electronically and in hard copy form. Please send your story entry and cover letter electronically to commaprizes@gmail.com in the form of a Word Doc, then send a hard copy of your story to Becky Harrison, Comma Press, Studio 510a, Hope Mill, 113 Pollard Street, Manchester, M4 7JA. The winning writer will receive £500 and all 10 shortlisted authors will be featured in an ebook anthology which will be published by Comma Press and sold online.

Please go through the rules on the website.

5. Futurescapes-Writing Contest

FutureScapes is an annual writing competition that asks writers to envision a particular future and tell its story. For 2017, the Futurescapes Contest theme is “Blue Sky Cities.” Contest winners will be published alongside multiple professional authors including Paolo Bacigalupi. There is an entry fee for second entry; first entry is free. The winner receives $2000 and five runners-up receive $500 each. Professional authors are not eligible to enter. Contest deadline is October 13, 2017. Check the rules in detail on the website.

6. Wordweavers Contest 

This is the 8th year of the Wordweavers Contest. All submissions for a single category should be copy pasted in the entry form along with the address details. The deadline for poetry (2-100 lines) and short story (5000 words) is August 15th, 2017. The entrant should be above 16 and a citizen of India. Entries should not have been previously published. Go through the details rules here.

 

Disclaimer:  The above-mentioned competitions and opportunities should not be treated as recommendations, but only information. The reader should verify the quality and suitability of each before submitting.

 

 

 

 

Textbooks, GST and South Asian Writers @ Lit Browser

What’s happening in the writing and publishing world in India right now? Found three stories related to this sphere.

There are around 10,000 publishers in India today, with textbooks owning a large chunk of the business. The managing director of the publishing house S Chand group is one example. Founded in 1939 in Old Delhi, the S Chand Group has raised its IPO in April 2017. They’ve come a long way for a company that publishes textbooks. To know about the textbook business in India, read this Forbes story by Paramita Chatterjee.

text books oc students semester GIF

Another story I stumbled upon is about the GST book connection. The good news is that there is no GST on books but the bad news is that making a book has just become a bit more expensive. So the raw materials that are required to create a book including paper and glue and the cost of employing freelancers have all gone up.

“But why will publishers not get the same benefit that other industries will get? As with the older Value Added Tax, the GST also includes the concept of Input Tax Credits (ITC). Put simply, this means that the seller of the final product has to pay GST at the prevailing rate, but can claim credits on all the GST already paid by his suppliers. In this scenario, the publisher would have been able to claim ITC on the GST paid its suppliers – had there been a GST on the books it’s selling.”

For more analysis read this essay in the Scroll by Jaya Bhattacharjee Rose.

i dont understand GIF

On a more positive note, writers from neighboring countries are finding the Indian publishing industry a better bet with a large number of manuscripts from Pakistan and Sri Lanka adding to the South Asian quotient. Why is this happening? Several reasons have been mentioned including rejection at the homefront owing to fear of controversy and censorship. Some writers also feel that India has a diverse enough audience to accommodate fiction from another country. More about South Asia’s publishing haven by Somrita Ghosh here.

 

Vodka, Vikram Seth and Indian Literary Mags @ Lit Browser

If you have missed the author Vikram Seth, you will appreciate this article called ‘A Suitable Girl’ is coming. What was it like to read Vikram Seth’s ‘A Suitable Boy’ 24 years ago? on Scroll by Devapriya Roy. The exciting news is that Vikram Seth is on track with A Suitable Girl and he writes about a new India, a far cry from the India Lata inhabited in his magnum opus published in 1993. There is also a link to a video conversation where Seth fans will get to meet the man himself and his cat, Vodka.

 

I also stumbled upon an interesting story about the inception of The Indian Quarterly, a literary magazine in India. The birth of the magazine was triggered by the horror of 26/11. The idea was to create a perspective through ‘art, poetry, photography and cinema’.  Thus came the birth of the shelfie:

A magazine or publication with staying power unlike those which transit momentarily in our homes before going to the kabadiwala.

What is interesting about this article is how it throws light on how little we know about the story of magazines. The author delves into the genesis of the little magazine founded by so many philosophers and thinkers in Europe and the US. The author narrates the peculiar story of the literary magazine Encounter who was backed by a group hard to guess.  I suggest you read the article to find out more.

The author is optimistic about the future of literary journals though he is aware that this space too is fast disappearing. What about India? Are there any literary magazines of note here?

The Lalit Kala Akademi used to publish a Lalit Kala Contemporary journal. Marg, a quarterly magazine founded by late novelist Mulk Raj Anand in 1946, is still going strong.

Many magazines have shut down and turned into collectibles. But The Indian Quarterly has long-term plans. Read the article by Madhu Jain here: From Selfie to Shelfie.

Textbooks, Middlemen and Bond @ Lit Browser

At Lit Browser, we talk about news that has to do with books, publishing, reading and writing in the subcontinent.

Today I came across an essay by Iain Marlow called India’s Book-Buying Habits Say A Lot About The Country’s Economy. Apparently, books have never sold better in India and desi writers are profiting from the hunger for books. The book business is worth $6.76 billion according to Nielson estimates. Educational bookdom is booming and English language books are raking in the money as are books with the word ‘India’ in them.

Some people are profiting from the gains that publishing is making in India. I stumbled upon a story in the Indian Express about how literary agents are on the rise here. If you want to know about the literary agent scene in India it would be a good idea to read this: The ‘middlemen’ who are changing India’s publishing scene.

If there has been a phenomenal writing success in India, it’s Ruskin Bond. Did you catch him on Scroll on his 83rd birthday? If you didn’t well read his book excerpt here.

Image result for ruskin bond

 

Interview with Hema Saramma Varghese, Freelance Book Cover Designer and Illustrator

We conducted an interview with Hema Saramma Varghese, the Freelance Book Cover Designer and Illustrator who works with us at Pothi.com and has been designing covers with us for around nine years. She has done her  MCA  from  MK University, Tamil Nadu. She lives in Trivandrum, Kerala, with her husband and daughter. Her passions include photography, visiting art exhibitions and experimenting with new handmade craftworks. She loves to watch old classic movies.  You can check out her FB feed here: www.facebook.com/revivedesigns.in

Describe the cover creation process in brief. What are the parameters you look at before starting and how do you go about it?

Most authors either call me up or maybe send me a short synopsis of the book they have written. They even send me their ideas of what they expect their cover to look like. If the idea is pretty complicated, then sometimes I need to step into their shoes and imagine what they are visualizing. Perspective is one parameter that I look into before I start with any complicated cover design work.

Sometimes the thoughts of an author can go pretty much overboard. They conceptualize a lot of stuff on their cover which don’t make a good fir aesthetically speaking. A bold and a specific theme that goes along with their writing is another parameter that I look into while creating cover design.

The last but not  least parameter includes the colors which give an overall feel of the book for a specific genre. But then sometimes, in the end, the colors are always left to the author’s discretion.

How many revisions does a cover typically go through?

A maximum of 3 revisions.

Why is cover design important? Your message to writers and potential cover creators.

Recently I read in a magazine that a cover design is like a 3-second ad and every writer needs a design that can catch the attention of the readers.

Well, I am a lover of art. When I was a young child, I had a library full of books published by Ladybird (A London-based publisher, now a part of Penguin publishers). There was one book that I read and I never liked its story. But I never gave the book to anyone because I loved its cover design.  Everytime I held the book, I spent more time looking at the design. After many years I realized that cover design is a unique art.

My message to all potential writers and all  writers who have not seen a breakthrough with all their writings is to Never separate creativity and writing. Both need each other just like a soul needs a heart and a heart needs a soul. Your creative idea for your cover design can speak more volumes than all the words you may have written in your book.

And to all potential cover creators, learn to respect the author’s ideas. Learn to implement it and learn to give. Ultimately this will help you to grow not only professionally but even on a personal level.

How did you get into cover designing?

After completing my Masters in Computer Applications from MK University, I got married and settled in Bangalore. I didn’t find any life in programming and instead I enjoyed doodling a lot. I created a portfolio of  art works and then mailed it to all the well-known advertising agencies in Bangalore. My works were noticed and thus I got a job as as a junior graphic designer in a graphic design firm. My first book cover design work was a handbook about a school festival from a reputed school in Bangalore.

That’s how I got into cover designing.

Who is your inspiration when it comes to art/cover design?

I pick up inspiration from  books, newspapers, film posters and even art exhibitions. Even nature is a great inspiration for me to do a cover design project.

Which cover that you have designed are you the proudest of? 

The Legend of Amarapali by Anurag Anand – a woman oriented historical fiction book.

You also create infographics and comics at InstaScribe. Tell us about the experience.

As a graphic designer, I love comics more than Infographics. On a professional level, learning to create comics is a challenging experience, especially when I need to create comics as per other people’s ideas. But then this helps me a lot in my visualization and illustration skills.

Some links to Infographics and Illustrations Sara has worked on at InstaScribe here:

World Book Tour- Japan

How to write a Romance Novel

The Secret Life of the Writer’s Cat

You’re a freelance cover designer based in Trivandrum. Tell us what you do when you don’t design covers and create graphic art.

Other than doing my usual household chores, I keep updating myself with new graphic design trends or participate in workshops where new handmade craft works are taught.

Do you have any advice for cover designers who are starting out- any software they should know or courses they should be doing?

Listen and learn about the author’s ideas and give as per the author’s requirement. Adobe Photoshop or any other image editing softwares will be the best software to start out with.

Thanks Sara! Was a pleasure talking to you.

 

 

What is Plagiarism?

homer simpson marge simpson episode 18 season 7 chief wiggum GIF

As readers and writers, you must be aware of what plagiarism or intellectual theft is and how you can prevent instances of it from coming through in your writing. If you use someone else’s words and ideas without attribution, it’s called plagiarism. This is common in the academic world where students copy passages without giving the author his due.  However, the consequences of plagiarism are dire. You could get expelled from college, lose a book contract and lose opportunities.

You may not be a copy cat and get involved in direct plagiarism or word to word copying on purpose, but you could get careless and accidentally plagiarize someone else’s work as well.

You can prevent this from happening by citing all your sources and writing with awareness. Many times students submit internet research without really understanding what it is they are writing about. Also while you take notes from sources, you must remember where your sources are. If you are quoting a sentence word to word, you should put the words quoted in double inverted commas. If you want to talk about the gist of an idea, you paraphrase it. It’s as simple as creating folders that hold the correct information; this is always safer than pasting information onto word docs and forgetting later where those notes came from.

More links on the whos and whats of plagiarism:

http://time.com/money/4413480/melania-trump-plagiarism-high-profile/

http://www.csmonitor.com/Books/2011/1208/5-famous-plagiarism-and-fraud-accusations-in-the-book-world/Alex-Haley

http://cmsw.mit.edu/writing-and-communication-center/avoiding-plagiarism/

http://isites.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=k70847&pageid=icb.page342057

Gift a Book Day

Today is Gift a Book Day! Don’t forget to gift a book to someone special! Send us your photos and experience at giftabookday@gmail.com.

giftabook-01

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Marketing Tip: Finding Influencers

Once you’ve written the book, you need the help of influencers or your fans to push the book sales. Influencers could be fellow authors, bloggers, reviewers, teachers, celebrities, fans and so many others. If other social media users tap your book into their social networks, it does help get the word out.

How do you find influencers? They could be your own friends or friends of friends. They could be people you look up to, other authors or readers who believe in your work.

booksales-01Gaining the support of influencers is a hard-won process and doesn’t happen overnight. You can’t flood someone’s inbox with emails and demand that they tweet about your book. It has to be on the basis of trust and this will take time plus you’ll have to return the favor as well.

How do you feel about promoting your book when you go out for book meets? Do you think that you are pushing the sell too hard? Do you feel better when someone recommends your book, instead of you having to do it? In the beginning, it will be hard and also pointless, considering the number of voices involved in self-promotion but if you connect with the right people, your book may just be known.

This is an excellent post by Jane Friedman about how to find and reach influencers to promote your book. Read it.

Another post on how to establish a fan base.

 

 

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Creative Writing Courses and Workshops for Indian Writers- 2021

Now updated for 2021

There are many opinions about creative writing courses. Does a real writer need a course at all? The argument goes that if engineering students can study engineering and artists can study art, then why not writing? A course in writing could open a student’s eyes to the fundamentals of plot, dialog, characterization and themes. Talking to fellow writers expands horizons and critiques can help your work at times. Though the final judgment of the work is yours and your editor’s, talking about writing can put you in a zone that will help nurture your writerly instincts.

Given the enormous interest, we have updated this post and provided a
revised version of what creative writing courses you can join in 2021!
Considering that the world has moved online since 2020, we will be looking at courses available on the internet as well.

What should you take into account before going ahead with a course?

  • The University/Mentor offering the course: Know where it is that you are applying. Find out more about the university or the credentials of the mentor who is running the program you want to participate in.
  • Recommendations by students who have done the course: Previous users of the course will mostly share their opinions of the course, either as reviews or on social media. Going through these will give you an idea about what you can expect.
  • Familiarity with the Coursework: Writing has many facets. You may want to learn more about how to write a good narrative or you may have trouble with genre writing. You may want to improve the pace of your writing or the momentum of your plot. You may want to understand more about book marketing. See if the course you choose can offer you exactly what you need at this point in your writing journey.
  • Group work or one-on-one: Now that most courses are online, you can also opt for courses that are live and those that you can retrieve videos of and work on at your own pace. Some courses offer interactive forums where you can discuss with your peers and some offer one-on-one feedback.
  • Certification: Does the course you are opting for provide certification? Is that essential for your writing skills to progress? Many MOOCs offer certificates once the payment is made; otherwise, the content on offer is free.

Writing Courses in India

  • Ashoka University: For those of you who want to study creative writing, there is a B.A. course in English and Creative writing at Ashoka University.

Writing Workshops in India

  • Bound: At Bound, there are plenty of online writing workshops held throughout the year, with top-notch mentors in fiction writing, screenplay writing, essay writing, etc.  
  • Anita’s Attic: Anita Nair runs Anita’s Attic in conjunction with Penguin. The program is structured over 12 weeks and is limited to 12 students. Admission for 2021 is closed.
  • Dum Pukht Writers’ Workshop: This is a two-week, in-residence workshop for fiction writers headed by Anil Menon, Parvin Saket and Akshat Nigam. The workshop was canceled in 2020 but will resume this year.
  • Bangalore Writers Workshop (BWW): This is a critique based workshop in Bangalore. Bangalore Writers Workshop (BWW) was founded by Bhumika Anand and Rheea Mukherjee in December 2011. Courses range from the literary to the journalistic.
  • Young Author Program (YAP): The Young Author Program is a creative writing workshop for young writers. The work of selected young writers will be published in an anthology.

Online Writing Courses

  • Udemy: All learners are familiar with Udemy. There are over 200, 000 students studying creative writing alone at this venue. You can check out their moderately priced creative writing courses on writing books, characterization, plotting, poetry, etc.
  • Coursera:  This American massive open online course provider has many free writing courses such as:Creative Writing: A course that teaches short story, narrative essay, and memoir. Techniques provided include characterization, plotting, etc. You learn to analyze and constructively evaluate peer writing. You draft, rewrite, and complete a substantial original story in the genre of your choosing.
    Write Your First Novel: This is a course provided by the Michigan State University. You will learn how to write and complete a full-length novel of 50,000 words from start to finish. You will have a finished manuscript in hand at the end of the course.
    Writing for Young Readers: Opening the Treasure Chest: This course offers video lectures, exercises, online readings, peer reviews, and guest appearances from world-renowned children’s authors. 
  • Masterclass: It’s worth the investment to do MasterClass with world-class writers. So for the fast-paced writing of thrillers, listen to James Patterson, to understand the nuances of sci-fi and fantasy think Neil Gaiman, for plotting think Dan Brown…you get the picture. You will have to shell out an annual cost; there is no monthly subscription.
  • Skillshare:  Want to learn how to write character-driven stories from famous authors? You can sign up for a free trial at Skillshare before you decide to take the available courses.
These are some courses that can help you jumpstart your writing journey. Tell us if there any other creative writing courses that you recommend!

 

Disclaimer:  The above-mentioned courses should not be treated as recommendations, but only information. The reader should verify the quality and suitability of the courses before enrolling in one.