The Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award
- Ongoing: Visit CreateSpace and sign up to receive contest updates and submission guidelines.
- February 2nd to 8th: Submit your novel for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award 2009.
- March 16: Quarterfinals begin, qualifying excerpts are available to read and review. Edit: this is interesting because in 2008, there was a contest for reviewers with a $2000 amazon gift certificate and an amazon kindle reader as prizes.
- April 15: Semifinalists are announced, early reviews provided by Publishers Weekly.
- May 15 – May 21: Finalist round begins, reviews by our expert panel are posted, and customers vote for the Grand Prize winner.
- May 22: Winner of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award is announced.
More on the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award -
- The inaugural edition was 2008, and Bill Loehfelm was the first winner.
- Bestselling authors Sue Monk Kidd ( The Secret Life of Bees) and Sue Grafton (Kinsey Millhone Mysteries) will lead this year’s expert panel.
- Several of the top 10 finalists have received publishing contracts - although the release dates are all in July 2009 etc. – wonder why the long delays. The winner Bill Loehfelm’s book Fresh Kills is already available (also on Kindle).
What really stands out for me (based on the snippet listed below) is that out of 5000 entries, at least 4 now have publishing deals. One in a thousand odds is much, much better than I would’ve thought.
… the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award launched in October 2007 and received more than 5,000 initial entries. Of those, excerpts from over 800 fiction entries were eligible for Amazon.com customers to read, rate, and review. Editors at Penguin Group (USA) reviewed the Top 100 semifinalists based on early customer reads and full manuscript reviews provided by Publishers’ Weekly. In March 2008, the leading Top 10 finalists were selected for the customers’ vote. A panel of experts–including bestselling author Elizabeth Gilbert, editor and publisher Amy Einhorn, literary critic John Freeman, and literary agent Eric Simonoff–also weighed in with their reviews for each of the top 10 novels. The top three finalists–Dwight Okita (The Prospect of My Arrival), Harry Dolan (Bad Things Happen), and Bill Loehfelm (Fresh Kills) traveled to New York City for the first weekend in April, where Bill Loehfelm was revealed as the winner.
I feel that the timeline is too proacted. October 2007 to April 2008, with books being published in July 2009 (for the three authors other than the winner) is just ridiculously long.
Filed under: publishing Tagged: | amazon, breakthrough novel award
In this economy, I love that it’s FREE. No entry fee and a chance at a publishing contract. Works for me.