Writing Contests

Dear Dr. Hack,

So here's the deal. I've got a novel and it's occurred to me that a good way to capture some attention is by entering contests. The only thing is, I don't know which ones to enter. Any suggestions?

--Rosalyn755


Dear Rosalyn,

Good god, for the love of all that's holy, stay away from writing contests. For the most part they're presided over by a bunch of cut-rate hacks who've weaseled their way into positions of trust and confidence.

By and large, the judges:

A) Have absolutely no writing ability, making their judgment highly suspect.

B) Run around touting their shiny credentials (i.e. an MFA) like it's actually worth the paper it's printed on.

C) Have worse taste than the sisters over at Glimmer Train. And I mean, while we're on the subject, have you ever picked up that god awful rag? It has the worst, let me say that again, the fucking worst, 'literary' fiction on the market force fucked between its pages. Do I really need to say it? I loathe Glimmer Train.

At any rate, Rosa, why the hell are you all hot and bothered to enter a contest? Everyone knows most of them are rigged from the get-go. The judges always have a predetermined favorite; some broke loser they drink beer with every week.

They wait for their drinking buddy to send in his moth eaten manuscript, declare a winner, then go back to jerking off to goat porn or whatever it is they do when they're not 'judging' or 'writing'.

Most of these judges are total assholes who've managed to slime their way into teaching some creative writing program by begging their big-shot daddy, who's already written them off as a failure who'll never make a frickin' red cent anyhow, into buying them a slot heading up a no-name writing course safely out of reach of the family business. And Papa Moneybags usually doesn't complain too much, because stuffing the incompetent progeny's ass away in a dark hole at the ass end of academia is what you'd call a sound financial decision.

The Dr. Hack short answer: Just take your manuscript outside and burn it. You have a better chance at the ashes floating up into the atmosphere, wafting around the globe once or twice, and falling perfectly assembled at the feet of an editor in New York after being magically reconstituted by ice crystals in the sky over Namibian airspace, than you do of winning one of these contests.

Or getting published, period. But that's another rant for another day.

Need advice? Sure you do. E-mail Dr. Hack and he'll set you straight.