I volunteered to judge for a contest for unpublished romance writers. This is the second time I've done this and I'm in awe of the unpublished talent out there. This experience leaves me with two vastly different impressions:
Positive
1. There's some good stuff out there in the unpublished world. If I number among their ranks, I should be proud. So many are books that I wish could continue reading. They are clean and professional. The ones that pull me out of the read with errors or plot issues just need some more fine tuning. None of them, so far, have been anything any writer should be ashamed of. In fact, it's obvious they're not ashamed--they hope to win this contest so they have confidence in their manuscript. They are my peers. Go team!
Negative
2. Who the hell am I to judge a contest? I'm just one of the gazillions of unpublished authors out there with only my failures to guide me. Good grief! Are the people judging my manuscript(s) schlubs like me? If so, where do they get off liking or not liking my writing? And why should I give any weight to the results?
Luckily the positive response dominates, but the negative one peeks through here and there. I guarantee it will come to the forefront of my defenses when I get my own results (unless they're good, in which case my judges were fellow geniuses).
Positive
1. There's some good stuff out there in the unpublished world. If I number among their ranks, I should be proud. So many are books that I wish could continue reading. They are clean and professional. The ones that pull me out of the read with errors or plot issues just need some more fine tuning. None of them, so far, have been anything any writer should be ashamed of. In fact, it's obvious they're not ashamed--they hope to win this contest so they have confidence in their manuscript. They are my peers. Go team!
Negative
2. Who the hell am I to judge a contest? I'm just one of the gazillions of unpublished authors out there with only my failures to guide me. Good grief! Are the people judging my manuscript(s) schlubs like me? If so, where do they get off liking or not liking my writing? And why should I give any weight to the results?
Luckily the positive response dominates, but the negative one peeks through here and there. I guarantee it will come to the forefront of my defenses when I get my own results (unless they're good, in which case my judges were fellow geniuses).
