I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: contests are invaluable to writers! First, it gives you deadlines to work by, and then it forces you to get your manuscript out there. I entered “A Long Way From Home,” my NaNoWriMo manuscript, into the Novel Journey’s “Out of the Slush Pile” contest that they are running all through 2010. I went online the moment I woke up on the day they were to announce the winners on the blog and was saddened to see that I was not the winner for the historical category. So, I get ready for work and trek into the office. Then, I pull up...
Interview with Cara Putman
Cara Putman is a writer of historical fiction and contemporary suspense. She has won several alwards for her writing, and her historical novel, Canteen Dreams won the 2008 ACFW Book of the Year — Short Historical; Sandhill Dreams was a 2009 ACFW Book of the Year Finalist. She resides in Lafayette, Indiana. When did you first start writing? My first short stories were written as part of third grade – I still have that journal filled with stories about a frog and toad and their adventures. Since then I’ve kept a journal and now have a bookshelf filled with journals. Then in high school I started two novels: one exploring...
Stumbling upon the ACFW
After I graduated college, I had a sudden pang of regret. I really enjoy learning more and pushing myself. I even loved homework. So I enrolled in an online class about how to get published. The class was interesting enough, but in my own research into proposals and my experience being published in magazines and newspapers, it was all very elementary for me. However, there was one lesson I took to heart. And it would change the course of my writing career. The instructor encouraged us to find contests and submit our work. In researching different writing contests, I found the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW) and their contest for unpublished...