QueryTracker Blog

Helping Authors Find Literary Agents

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Agent Judged Contest Has Begun!


Our agent-judged one-line pitch contest began today, Wednesday, October 27th at 9:00 am Eastern Standard Time.

Joan Paquette of the Erin Murphy Literary Agency is judging the contest.

The contest entry window is 24 hours and will end at 9:00 am Eastern Standard time on Thursday, October 28th.

You may pitch more than one project, but be certain all projects are complete, edited and polished enough to present to an agent.

Submissions must be made via our online submission form. (A free QueryTracker.net membership is necessary to use the form and can be accessed from the form page.) Only entries received through the online form will be accepted. Entries emailed directly to the agent or agency will be disqualified.

This contest is for completed children’s projects only. The genres include children’s literature from picture books and chapter books through middle grade and young adult novels of all sub-genres. NO ADULT NOVELS OR PROJECTS as this agency only represents children’s fiction including YA.

Ms. Paquette wants to receive one-line pitches and the first 100 words of your manuscript (+ or – half a sentence. Don’t just end mid-sentence).

Details for this contest were posted yesterday and have been in the contest widget in the sidebar for several weeks.

The response time and announcement of the winners (who will receive full and partial requests from Ms. Paquette) will depend on the number of entries. The more entires, the longer it will take--one of the pitfalls of not having an entry cut-off. Ms. Paquette hopes to have the results within two weeks. I'll give updates as to her progress and the winners will be notified directly via email as well.

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to post them in comments or email Mary at marytlindsey@gmail.com.

Best of luck to everyone and special thanks to Ms. Paquette for judging.

35 comments:

Schriscoe said...

Thank you Joan for this wonderful opportunity!
And thank you QueryTracker!

Best of luck to everyone!!
Sharon

Robyn Campbell said...

Super opportunity here folks. YIKES! Better go and grab my laptop. Thanks Ms.Paquette. Thanks QueryTracker. :)

Good luck to everyone who enters.

Megan K. Bickel said...

I'm very excited about this opportunity! Best words forward! Thank you QueryTracker and Ms. Paquette!

Unknown said...

Thanks so much for this amazing contest! I'm glad I can sort of "query" Ms. Paquette here! :D

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much Query Tracker and Ms Paquette for this fantastic opportunity to submit a 'query'.

Summarising my novel into a short statement and focussing on the first 100 words has also been a great learning activity.

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much Query Tracker and Ms Paquette for this fantastic opportunity to submit a 'query'.

Summarising my novel into a short statement and focussing on the first 100 words has also been a great learning activity.

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much Query Tracker and Ms Paquette for this fantastic opportunity to submit a 'query'.

Summarising my novel into a short statement and focussing on the first 100 words has also been a great learning activity.

CL said...

I just tried using the online submission form; the 'first 100 words' only let me paste the first line. When I hit return to try to type in the rest of it, I inadvertently entered my ms. Could someone please help me with this?

I'm going to try again right now. But I'd appreciate any advice. I am a query tracker member and it's 9:35. Thank you!!

Brenda Drake said...

Thanks QT and Joan for such a great opportunity! Good luck everyone!

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

Hi, CL. Shoot me a personal email and we'll fix this up! marytlindsey@gmail.com

http://www.samposey.com/ said...

I have a similar comment as CL. Is this set up so that you can only see one line of your entry? Because I only saw the first ine of the first 100 words, and only the last line of the pitch.

Jarucia said...

Thanks, QT...this is the kick in the pants I needed to get back into the aspiring writer game after an extended hiatus to baby raise and wrangle since my son's birth in Jan.

Mary (since you responded to some one else, I hope you see this), I had a Mommy-brain mis-submit and contacted you via email about it.

Good luck to everybody!

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

The text box on the form has been enlarged so that you can see or easily scroll to see your entry. If you want to resubmit, go ahead and send me an email to that effect.

If I find an entry that is incomplete, I will contact the author and they will have a chance to resend.

Thanks. This is the first time we've had an agent allow a sample and the form has experienced growing pains.

Mary marytlindsey@gmail.com.

Unknown said...

Thank you, Query Tracker and Ms Paquette. What a great opportunity. I was so excited that I hit send before I even entered anything. Tee hee. I’m so sorry.

But then emailed Mary in a panic, but my mail server wouldn't send it to that address for some reason. Still panicking, I hit return on the contest email and got a reply from the wonderful Patrick.

He said he'd fixed it and deleted my blank entry. Phew!! I was bouncing on my seat in a panic. No way did I want to miss this great opportunity.

I can just imagine all those panicky faces through their computer windows. LOL.

Good luck everyone.

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for the opportunity!

I submitted my entry, but didn't get a confirmation, so I'm not sure if it went through or not???

Thanks.

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

I'll check it out and let you know, LB.

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

Glad it worked out, Trish! Good luck.

CL said...

Thanks to Ms. Paquette and to Query Tracker-- I'm very excited about this contest!

And thanks for helping me iron out the earlier difficulties!

CL said...

Just read through the comments, and I have to say, panicking is part of the writer's life! :)

Shannon O'Donnell said...

Thank you, QT hosts and Joan, for this awesome opportunity! :-)

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

Hey, CL, you think YOU were panicking? Pat is amazing. He went in and reprogrammed the form in no time. We've over 200 entires and no problems since the few this morning. Whew.

CL said...

Hey, Mary, you guys obviously ROCK! Thanks for all you did to make this contest work for all us (panicky) writers! :)

Unknown said...

We were supposed to get a confirmation? I didn't get one.

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for this great opportunity!

I didn't get a confirmation either, were we supposed to receive one?

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for this great opportunity!

I didn't get a confirmation either, were we supposed to receive one?

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for this great opportunity!

I didn't get a confirmation either, were we supposed to receive one?

Deb Salisbury, Magic Seeker and Mantua-Maker said...

Thank you, Joan, and all the QueryTracker staff!

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

No. You would not have received a confirmation email. The form does give an acknowledgement that it sent successfully. This appears on the screen right after you hit submit. So far, we've had no trouble. If you feel your entry might not have sent properly, shoot me an email and we'll check. marytlindsey@gmail.com

A Pen In Neverland: Angela Peña Dahle said...

Wonderful! Thanks QT! Thanks Joan Paquette! You are spectacular for setting this up, etc.

Anonymous said...

Thank you Query Tracker for another great contest and a huge thanks to Ms. Paquette for judging. It's really made me focus on what's important!!

Unknown said...

Mary and Patrick, you're both awesome, and so patient with us and our submitting problems. Thanks so much. And thank you too, Ms. Paquette.

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

Hey, Trish. Y'all have been great. No real problems at all. The whole thing has run smoothly.

Kim said...

Thank you all for this great opportunity! How many entries did you receive total?

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

We don't know yet. It's still open. :) We'll have a tally at 10 Eastern.

If we see anything that is incomplete, we'll contact the entrant via email.

Mary Lindsey / Marissa Clarke said...

Well, it's closed. Pat won't have a number count until tonight. Good luck everyone!