2020 Royal Ascot Update

The Beau Monde’s Royal Ascot 2020 contest for unpublished writers has been canceled.

With statements from literary agents and publishing houses concerning their connections to RWA®, we were not be able to recruit agents and editors for the final judging round. The consensus of the Board was that we maintain the high standard of the Royal Ascot and wait until we can offer contestants a panel of strong final round judges again.

For more information on the contest itself, please visit The Royal Ascot Contest page.

Announcing the 2012 Royal Ascot!

Unpublished writers: Polish the first 7000 words of those manuscripts! The 2012 Royal Ascot will open for Entries on February 1st, 2012. In the next few weeks, details will be available on our webpage and through MyRWA, but, for now, here are highlights:

This year’s contest will be open to unpublished authors and authors who have not been contracted in book length fiction by RWA PAN definition in the last 5 years. All entries must have at least partial Regency (Late Georgian) setting, broadly defined: within the United Kingdom between 1780 and 1840. No synopsis is necessary!Our categories will be used to assign first round judges to the manuscript types they prefer:

Regency Historical (longer Regency or Mainstream Regency-set)

Hot Regency (Very sensual to Erotic Regency, at author’s discretion)

Wild Regency (Paranormal, Time Travel, other similar Regency)

Sweet & Mild Regency (Traditional, Inspirational, Young Adult or other without explicit sex).

Each entry will be judged by three judges, including at least one published in Regency Romance. The lowest score will be dropped, and the top six entries will move to the final round.

Our Final Round Judges are:

Agents

  • Stephany Evans, Fine Print Literary
  • Louise Fury, L Perkins Agency
  • Pam Hopkins, Hopkins Literary Associates

Editors

  • Lauren Plude, Hachette Book Group
  • Angela Polidoro, Random House
  • Deb Werksman, Sourcebooks

Besides the February 1st opening, some additional important dates are:

  • Friday April 6th, 2012, midnight PDT: Deadline for all parts of entry
  • Finalists Announced May 25th, 2012
  • Winner(s) will be announced at The Beau Monde Conference

Further details will be announced on the blog and website soon! If you have any questions, feel free to contact this year’s co-coordinators, Sarah Tormey and Wendy La Capra, at royalascotcontest@gmail.com. Thank you!

Royal Ascot Contest- Making Contests Work For You

With the deadline looming for the Beau Monde’s Royal Ascot Contest, our amazing contest coordinator, Sarah Tormey, talks about  MAKING CONTESTS WORK FOR YOU.

As an aspiring writer, I admit I have caught contest fever from time to time, and was always disappointed when my work did not final. I would stop entering and focus on submitting. After a year of this back and forth, I started to see the similarities between the judges’ comments and my rejection letters. Both pointed out similar flaws or problem areas.

This fall, after four months of spending every waking (and some not so awake moments) caring for my newborn son, I decided to enter a handful of contests to motivate me to keep writing. I needed something to me get back in writing mode and the deadlines helped.

But this time, I tried something different. I submitted one polished work and one first draft. And I also changed what I looked for in a contest. Instead of focusing on the final round judges, I looked for contests that featured trained first round judges (for the best feedback) and a reduced entry fee for subsequent submissions to avoid breaking the bank with contest fees.

Overall, I think my strategy worked. The polished manuscript chapters won one contest and I received a request for a full. In another, the same chapters did not even make the final rounds. But both offered great insights into how I could improve my writing. This was especially true for the first draft chapters.

I decided to enter the beginning of my first contemporary to see if I was on the right track. After all what could be better than a group of strangers sending me their honest opinions? Much to my surprise, I received an honorable mention and a request for a full from the final round judge. Going forward, I plan to submit all my working drafts to contests. The deadlines coupled with the stellar feedback have pushed me to write even on the days when I’ve been up all night with my teething baby.

In fact, I am so grateful for my contest experiences that I decided to return the favor by coordinating the 2011 Royal Ascot.

The Royal Ascot is a contest devoted to the promotion of Regency Romances by encouraging the development of authors who set stories in the Regency Period (and features both trained judges and a lower fee for subsequent entries). If you write Regencies (broadly defined as within the United Kingdom between 1780 and 1840) and are looking for stellar feedback from trained judges, this is the contest to enter. The deadline is April 1st and finalists will be announced the first week in May. If you do not write stories at least partially set in this time period, please help us spread the word to your friends, critique partners and writer’s groups.

For more information, please visit: http://www.thebeaumonde.com/royalascot/.

Sarah Tormey was a Mass Merchandise Sales Representative at Random House. Her job was to sell romances to chain stores like Target, Stop & Shop and Wal-Mart. Sarah is now pursuing her dream of writing romance novels. To read excerpts of her work and her blog, visit .

Posted with permission of the author.

Royal Ascot Contest Deadline Approaching

The 2011 Royal Ascot Contest Deadline is April 1st!

This year, the contest will feature trained first round judges and a panel of Final Round judges including three editors and three agents.

For additional details, visit the website at: http://www.thebeaumonde.com/royalascot/

Final Round Judges Panel include:

  • Selina McLemore, Senior Editor at Grand Central Publishing
  • Jessica Faust, Bookends Literary Agency
  • Kevan Lyon, Marshall Lyon Literary Agency
  • Elizabeth Bistrow, Editor at NAL
  • Deborah Nemeth, Editor at Carina Press
  • Rebecca Strauss, McIntosh & Otis Literary Agency

Contests are a great way to get feedback on a new project as well as get your work in front of an agent or editor.

If you have any questions, email our contest coordinator –royalascotcontest@gmail.com.

Posted with permission of the author.