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Uncommonly Good Contest

Announcing the Uncommonly Good Contest! Working in cooperation with Whispers Publishing, the staff of Sycophant Hex are thrilled to take part in launching a publishing career for one of our own! URL for Whispers Publishing: http://www.whispershome.com You heard right—the first prize in this contest will be a publishing contract from Whispers Publishing! The winning entry will be published in ebook format, royalties paid, with professional editing, a great cover, and resources to promote your winning book! Please carefully read the rules and restrictions provided by Whispers (posted below) prior to submission. Rules and Restrictions Awards So how does it work? How will submissions be judged? I still have questions! Rules and Restrictions - There is no entry fee; all registered Chaos members can enter. - Submissions are due no later than midnight EST on April 15, 2011. - Original work only; no cross-overs, no fanfic. - Submissions cannot currently be published online or elsewhere, and no other publishing company may own rights to the material. - Length: 15,000 - 25,000 words - Single authorship—no groups or co-authors recognized. - Submissions can be made under the author's legal name, fandom username, or a chosen penname. The winning entrant will be required to provide their legal name to Whispers' staff to allow for royalties to be paid. No one else, including Sycophant Hex staff, will be privy to this information, in order to preserve the privacy of our site members. - Multiple submissions are allowed and encouraged. - Unfortunately, past and current members of Sycophant Hex staff are not eligible to participate. - By submitting, authors agree to edit accordingly to present the best possible entry. - All entrants must be at least 18 years old, and legally able to enter into a publishing contract. - All entrants must be registered with Chaos, found here, prior to submission. Prior story submission to this archive or to any of Sycophant Hex's archives is not required. - Second and third place winners allow an excerpt from their stories, or their entire stories (author's choice), to be posted on Chaos, Sycophant Hex's Original, Crossover and Non-HP Fanfiction site, with an appropriate competition banner inserted. - Genres allowed:       - Mainstream/contemporary fiction      - Romance       - Mystery       - Thriller       - Paranormal       - Fantasy       - Drama       - Sci-Fi - Mature/adult content is accepted, provided it fits within the restrictions set forth by the publisher, listed below. Restrictions set by Whispers Publishing: - No bestiality (if your story involves shape-shifters, no sex between humans and shape-shifters while they’re in their animal forms). - No sex scenes between anyone less than twenty-one years old. - No sex involving the use of any tool not designed for sex. - No rape scene graphically written (if a rape happens, let it happen ‘off-screen’). - No hardcore BDSM or role-playing. - No homosexual pairings. - For further information, please see the Whispers Submissions page here: http://whispershome.com/submissions/ Awards First prize: A publishing contract from Whispers Publishing. Second prize: $100 gift card from Amazon.com Third prize: $50 gift card from Amazon.com So how does it work? Completed submissions should be emailed to SHUncommonlyGoodContest@gmail.com as an attachment in .html format for the ease of the judging panel. Italics/bold/etc should be coded into the file by the author prior to submission. The first line of the file should include the following: - Author's name or penname - Chaos username (if different than penname) - Contact email address - Story title - Word Count This is a blind competition; only our webmistress, JackieJLH, will have access to the submission email address. Each story will be reviewed to ensure that it meets the rules/restrictions set above. Any stories that do not meet these restrictions will be returned to the author to allow for any changes prior to the April 15, 2011 deadline. Once a story is confirmed to have met the minimum word count/content restrictions set forth by the publisher, JackieJLH will record the author's information in a confidential file, remove it from the story text, and present the submission to the judging panel. Judging will take place from April 15, 2011 until May 1, 2011 to determine the top five entries. At this time, these entries will be reviewed by the SH staff for any major spelling/grammar/formatting issues, and the authors will be contacted about any recommended corrections. The final version of these five stories will then be submitted to Whispers no later than May 15, 2011 to be reviewed by their editing staff, and the first, second, and third place winners will be announced on July 1, 2011. The grand prize winner will receive a publishing contract from Whispers publishing for their winning entry, as well as free advertising for their finished book on Sycophant Hex. The second place winner will receive a $100 Amazon.com giftcard from Sycophant Hex, as well as having their winning story (or an excerpt from their story, at the author's discretion) featured on Chaos. The third winner will receive a $50 Amazon.com giftcard from Sycophant Hex, as well as having their winning story (or an excerpt from their story, at the author's discretion) featured on Chaos. Remaining entries can then be submitted to the Chaos queue by their authors, or can be privately submitted for consideration to the publishing company of the author's choice. How are the submissions judged? All submissions will be reviewed by a panel of fifteen judges, a combination of SH admins and randomly selected fandom volunteers. (A call for volunteers will be made in early March.) Judges will review and rate each submission. The five highest-rated stories will then be reviewed by SH admins, and the authors will be given an opportunity to make any spelling/grammar/formatting corrections. Finally, the five stories will be submitted to Whispers Publishing to be reviewed by their editorial staff. The Whispers staff will make the final determination of first, second and third place winners for the competition. I still have questions! Please direct all questions and concerns to sh.admins@gmail.com.

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