Virtual Pitch Slam

Lots of Write Nonfiction in November participants write books. This year, those who do, indeed, decide to write a book from scratch have the chance to participate in a post-WNFIN virtual pitch slam. Even though WNFIN is not a contest, participants who complete a full book manuscript in a month during the WNFIN challenge can win a post-challenge prize.

This year the San Francisco Writers University, part of the non-profit San Francisco Writers Conference, The Writer Entrepreneur Network, and four literary agents and authors have teamed up with WNFIN/NaNonFiWriMo to reward non-fiction book writers for their hard work in November. Anyone who starts and finishes a book during the challenge can enter the virtual pitch slam. You can enter your pitch, a 25-75 word “elevator speech,” to the team of agents who will select a grand prize winner as well as a second and third place winner.

The first place, grand prize, winner receives:

• a 45-minute in-person or phone consult with literary agent April Eberhardt, an advocate for authors exploring traditional as well as independent publishing options, focused on how best to hone your work for any form of publication, be it traditional or independent, as well as discussion of the best strategy for your overall body of work
• a 30-minute phone consultation about your non-fiction work with non-fiction literary agent Michael Larsen
• a free one-year membership in San Francisco Writers University (value $49), along with 10 downloadable writing classes of their choice (value $100)
• a free membership in The Writer Entrepreneur Network www.theWENet.ning.com
• copies of literary agents Jeff and Deborah Herman’s Write the Perfect Book Proposal and Jeff Herman’s Guide to Book Publishers, Editors, and Literary Agents

The second place winner receives:

• a copy of Chuck Sambuchino’s Create Your Writer Platform: The Key to Building an Audience, Selling More Books, and Finding Success as an Author
• a copy of WNFIN founder Nina Amir’s books, How to Blog a Book, Write, Publish and Promote Your Work One Post at a Time
• 15 minute platform or blogging consult with Nina Amir

Third place winner receives:

• WNFIN founder’s Nina Amir’s books, How to Blog a Book, Write, Publish and Promote Your Work One Post at a Time, and How to Evaluate Your Book for Success.

Agents will review the pitches in the weeks following the end of the WINFIN challenge, and winners will be contacted by the end of December.

If you want to learn how to pitch, please read “How to Write a Winning Book Pitch”.

Virtual Pitch Slam Rules

Since the challenge is completed on an honor system, so is the contest to a certain extent. Here are the “rules” (as stated prior to Nov. 1):

1. Sign into WNFIN using the participants’ page.
2. Describe your book project with a 25-75 word pitch. (The shorter the better.) This is an elevator speech like you would use at a conference, in a query letter or in your book proposal’s overview and should include a working title and subtitle.  (You can hone this later if need be–see #6). (For more info, read this.)
3. Describe how many chapters you think the book will have and approximately how many words you plan to write by month’s end.
4. Make an “oath” as to whether you have started on this project prior to Nov. 1 or will be starting from scratch on Nov. 1. (You can prepare, and should prepare, but you should not begin writing until Nov. 1.) “I, (your name), do solemnly swear that I wrote this whole book during the Write Nonfiction in November Challenge.” (You know if you lie about this you will jinx your chances of ever getting your book published, right?)
5. On Nov. 30. before midnight sign into the WNFIN status updates page.
6. Let us know if you finished your book. (Refer to your earlier comment on the participants page, and restate your pitch; this can be an edited or revised version if need be, but it should sound pretty similar.) If you DID NOT do steps #2, #3, #4, but you did sign in, you can still participate; you must have signed in and now swear you did, in fact, write the whole manuscript during November.
7. Then send an email to namir(at)copywrightcommunications(dot)com with your pitch and your word count and your oath, once more, that you completed the project in 30 days during WNFIN. (Refer to #4 if you even think of lying about this…bad mojo created for lying!)
8. Be sure to include your EMAIL ADDRESS and MAILING ADDRESS in your email to Nina (see #7).
9. Attach your manuscript to the email. (We won’t actually be reading them; this serves as proof that you finished but the winner might find an agent taking a peek–who knows.)

During the month of December, the team of agents will review the pitches.

Judges

The literary agents who will make up the panel of judges for the first ever post-WNFIN Virtual Pitch Slam are:

• April Eberhart of April Eberhart Literary
• Verna Dreisbach of Dreisbach Literary Management
• Michael Larsen of Larsen and Pomada Literary Agents
• Deborah Herman Levine of The Jeff Herman Agency