Hi everyone! If you’re new to the blog, welcome!

If not, you know I’ll be submitting my novel, The Blood Between Us, to a mentoring program/contest called Pitch Wars where published and agented authors each choose one writer, and they work together for three months to make the mentee’s novel the best it can be. At the end, there’s a showcase for participating agents to make requests.

You can learn more about Pitch Wars here!

It’s a highly competitive program and comes with its fair share of blood, sweat and tears. The likelihood of being selected is only 2.8%. But there are three main reasons why I – and many others – have chosen to participate this year!

#1 The Opportunity

It’s hard to get an agent’s attention. You need a compelling query, captivating first chapter, the right timing and so much more. Pitch Wars helps you make the most of your submission materials, and it’s one way to get an extra feather in your writing cap – whether you get an offer from the agent showcase or begin querying. You have the credibility of a respected organization to back you and a built in opportunity to easily access respectable agents – over 120 participated last year!

#2 The Mentoring

For me, writing is and has always been a truly collaborative process. Beta readers, critique partners, family and friends. But without an agent, it’s really hard to get the industry insight and experience needed to really push your manuscript to the next level.

So the ability to work with a published or agented author is really a true benefit. They’ve been through this process already – maybe multiple times. Not only do they have the obvious talent, but they know more of the inner workings of how to make a manuscript better and sellable. You can learn so much!

#3 The Community

The #PitchWars community is legendary. Between Facebook groups, hashtag challenges and networking, it’s a great way to meet other writers – whether they’re friends, new critique partners or future business connections. You don’t even have to be chosen to take part! There’s #PWPoePrompts before submission even opens so that you can get to know other hopefuls, and lots of opportunities if you are selected as a mentee.

There’s a million other smaller reasons: it gives you a real deadline, you might get feedback even if you aren’t chosen, the numbers are higher than cold querying… The list goes on and on!

For me, the decision was also very personal. Since parting ways with my agent in June, I’ve been dreading jumping back into the query trenches. I really wanted to explore a different method, and from all the amazing things I’ve heard, Pitch Wars seems like a great fit. The timing also just worked out perfectly since I’ll be finishing up revisions for The Blood Between Us just in time for the submission window.

So if you were on the fence about participating, join me! You’ve got nothing to lose and so much to gain.

If you’re planning on doing Pitch Wars this year, let me know in the comments. And stay tuned for a post all about The Blood Between Us next week!