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Filed in: blog | giveaway Tags: birthday celebration | first five pages critique | giveaway | golden heart
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*beams*
It seems that everyone throws some sort of special giveaway on their blog for their birthday, so I tried to think what would be something nice that I would also enjoy.
The Golden Heart deadline for signing up was yesterday and the due date for sending in the entry is December 2nd. Everyone knows I get kind of sentimental around Golden Heart season, so how about a five page critique?
I’m a bit of a first five pages nut. Don’t ask me how to write page 6-300, because that’s still a mystery to me.
So if you leave a comment here with your premise in 1-2 sentences and you’ll be entered in the drawing. I’ll draw randomly Friday night. The premise is just to let me know you’re interested in the critique rather than just here to wish me a big old Happy Birthday. (Yes, I am an attention ho on my birthday.) You don’t have to be entered in the Golden Heart, but if you are, just let me know and I’ll send a little Ruby-slipper heel clicking your way for good mojo.
I’ll announce the winner Friday. The winner needs to send their five pages to me by Saturday, 11/20. I’ll return it by Monday–plenty of time to tweak for that Golden Heart entry!
21 Comments
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Filed in: blog | events | pitching | publishing | rwa Tags: golden heart | rwa10 | the call | writing motivation
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Dear Author,
Forgive me for this bout of sentimentality, but I’m a reflective sort of person. Last year, on this day, the Friday before RWA conference, I received a call on my cell phone while at work. Blithely, I called the number back when I had a break and found that it rang to the message machine of Harlequin Mills & Boon in the UK. An English accent never sounded more lovely!
The actual “Call” wouldn’t come for another several days. I had the weekend to stew, my agent had other editors to nudge, and after a little bit of this and a little bit of that, I sold Butterfly Swords five days later on Wednesday morning in Washington D.C. at RWA ’09.
It was an exciting conference for me, to sell right there among so many friends. I was also up for a Golden Heart award. Someone asked me if I still wanted to win even though I’d sold.
“Heck, yeah, I want it,” I said. “Winners always want the ball.” (Extra credit for anyone who can place that quote.)
You see, I’m absolutely awful at playing it cool and nonchalant. Some people try to downplay the possibility of disappointment by voicing their denials. I have as much self-doubt as the next person, but I’ve always been someone who fell on the side of saying, “Yes, I want it, I want it. Disappointment, I dare you to smack me in the face.”
Because can’t we all admit, we all WANT IT?
Neither approach affects the outcome. The Golden Heart scores were already tallied and that envelope was already sealed. But maybe the attitude does matter. Maybe just admitting your dreams proudly, as vulnerable as that makes you, affects you in little ways — affects your pen upon the page, trying just a little harder to pull out the words from inside you.
Anyway, it’s RWA time again. A bunch of authors, hopefuls, and the rest of Romancelandia will be converging on Orlando. I’ll be heading there and not blogging for the entire week.
This year, I’m presenting the Golden Heart award in the historical category and I just wanted to say to whoever the winner is going to be, and also to all the other writers who are pitching, networking, and waiting for “The Call”:
Aim high. Dream big. It can happen, it can happen, it can happen. Exactly as you dream.
You don’t have to play it cool.
Good luck.
- Jeannie Lin
4 Comments
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Filed in: blog Tags: finalists | golden heart | rita
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Yesterday I was getting all emotional-like, telling my husband, tomorrow’s the big day. The Golden Heart/RITA announcements. I don’t have a horse in the race this year, but I have a feeling I’m still going to be refreshing and searching for familiar names.
What can I say? It’s been a wonderful year and it started one year ago today. I know the Golden Heart final isn’t a golden ticket, but…I’d like to think that someone’s dreams are coming true starting today.
So I just had to say good luck and, once the announcements are all out, congratulations! Dream big and aim high, finalists. You’re allowed to.
If you’re a GH/RITA hopeful and want to join the celebration over at the RSS blog, come on by! Everyone’s a bundle of nerves so jump right in.
Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood Golden Heart/RITA cyber-celebration
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Filed in: blog Tags: call stories | golden heart | past finalists | rita | ruby-slippered sisterhood
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 The Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood is posting call stories for the Golden Heart and RITAs today. About this time last year I was a basketcase. The versions I had submitted after the Golden Heart contest were starting to final, but I didn’t know if I had made the critical changes in time for the GH. Plus I was finding that 4 out of 5 judges tended to score Butterfly Swords well, while one judge would hate it. Exactly the odds I needed for the GH!
All this sounds a lot more well thought out than it actually was inside my head.
Well, one of my crazy things I did was Google all things Golden Heart related. If anyone’s as crazy as I was and you need your fix, head on over to the Ruby Sisters and hear about the calls from past GH and RITA finalists.
My GH call story is actually pretty boring, but it was the thing that started it all:
http://www.rubyslipperedsisterhood.com/rss/index.php/where-were-you-when-you-got-the-call/
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Filed in: Announcements | guest blogs | writing Tags: bemis productions | blog contests | critiques | finalists | golden heart | ruby-slippered sisterhood | writing contests
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 The Ruby-Slippered Sisterhood (of which I am a proud member) unveils our blog today (9/21/2009) in honor of the opening of Golden Heart® season.
For everyone considering the Golden Heart® contest or working on polishing their manuscripts, the Sisterhood is offering critiques and other giveaways for our inaugral month as well as tips and musings on our respective writing journeys. These women are some of the most amazing and inspiring people I’ve met and, as you can see from the blog, quite a fun group.
The Golden Heart® will always hold a special place in my heart. Before I was announced as a finalist, very few agents or editors would give my time period a chance. The GH® opened doors for me and in a span of three months I went from having a manuscript that was almost ready to be stuffed under the bed to signing an agent and selling!
My first blog for the RSS is this Friday in which I discuss why I finaled. I’m giving away a first chapter critique on that day and I hope that the GH® will open doors for many aspiring authors this year. Other Ruby Sisters are offering critiques as well, so come by and join the launch party all month.
Oh, and definitely ogle the beautiful site design from our own Elisabeth Bemis. She did an amazing job, didn’t she?
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Filed in: Announcements | book reviews | friends and family | interviews | The Bookshelf | writing Tags: agent stories | author interview | butterfly swords | golden heart | publishing journey | romance writers on the journey | success stories | the call
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 Keli hosts the "Romance Writers on the Journey" blog My interview is featured today on Keli Gwyn’s “Romance Writers on the Journey” blog. The blog features unpublished and debut authors on the road to publication. I like to read the blog for inspiration and Keli caught me when I was hanging around to find out more about some of my fellow Ruby Slippered sisters from the Golden Heart® 09 tour.
I think she does a fabulous job researching these interviews. It’s all the dirty details on my contest warpath and the roller coaster I’ve been on since March. (Never before revealed online…shhh!!!) To put things into perspective, when I volunteered to do the interview in June, I had received the GH@ nomination and was thinking the Call would never come.
Hop on over and take a look.
http://romancewritersonthejourney.wordpress.com/2009/09/02/meet-debut-author-jeannie-lin/
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Filed in: Announcements | events | publishing Tags: butterfly swords | golden heart | historical romance | rwa | speech
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 When they were getting ready to announce my category, my husband took my hand. I held onto him so hard as they read the names of all the finalists. Yes, I wanted to win even though I had a contract. Don’t we all hope and dream for the moon?
And I did win. I won, I won, I won! I can always boast that Butterfly Swords won the Golden Heart® for the best historical romance manuscript of 2009. No one can take that away. Ever.
Is this ungraceful of me to strut like this? I do admire and genuinely hope the best for my GH® sistas, especially in the historical category. In fact, I have a feeling a couple of them are also really, really close to signing. One in particular, but I won’t name names. 
It’s just been such a long journey with so few celebrations up until the very last few months. And even with the contest placements and manuscript requests, I was getting scared. The best agents in the industry and the top romance editors were saying my Asian setting was too risky.
When I got up on stage for my acceptance speech, do you know how I felt? I felt like that moment at the end of the movie, The Pursuit of Happyness. They finally announce that Chris (Will Smith) has earned the job he worked so tirelessly for without any promise of success. The executive says, “Tell me Chris. Was it as easy as it looked?”
Chris fights back tears as he replies: “No. No it was not.”
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Filed in: events | pitching | slice of life | writing Tags: golden heart | RWA conference | writer anxiety
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Close up: Me frozen like a deer in the headlights.
Is it really the first of July tomorrow?
Cue: Hysterical scream.
I don’t freak out often, believe it or not. But July means that there’s only a couple of weeks left until RWA conference. I’ve been building up to this for so long. I’m going to room with friends I haven’t seen in a year. I’m totally excited to meet a bunch of online writerly acquaintances that I’ve made recently. I’m thinking over elevator pitches and picking outfits.
I expect to be on a natural high the entire week of July 15-18 in D.C. with all the networking parties, workshops and award ceremonies. Butterfly Swords is up for four awards including the Golden Heart®. The Dragon and the Pearl (aka Silk and Seduction) is up for an award as well. *eek* I need to prepare a speech for the GH® in case I get called up because I don’t want to look like a total goof up there. (I never could wing it in 3rd grade with the book reports. I know I’m not going to be able to wing it now so I’m preparing a speech.)
Underneath it all, I know the build up is going to lead to the adrenaline crash of the century once it’s all over. Already dreading that.  All the while, “real life” continues.
Camera pans wide: Big, daunting “real life” monsters closing in. Let’s have them dressed as the Wild Things from “Where the Wild Things Are.”
Fade to black.
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Filed in: Announcements | book reviews | writing Tags: contests | finalist | golden heart | historical romance | the call
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Butterfly Swords is a finalist in the Historical Romance category for the Golden Heart©!
At 7:59 am I checked the clock and at 8:00am the phone rang! It was Terri Brisbin from RWA telling me that Butterfly Swords had finalled. I literally sank to the floor.
More later, for now — I bask!
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Filed in: book reviews | miscellaneous | writing Tags: Announcements | contest | gh | golden heart | romance | unpublished
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One more day until Golden Heart/RITA announcements!!!! The anticipation is one of the reasons I enter. I’m planning on hitting the refresh button on Judi Fennell’s and the RWA national website a gazillion times tomorrow.
A friend of mine says I can just pay her $50 and she’ll call me or not call me on March 25. She may talk big, but she entered too.
I hope someone I know finals so I have someone to cheer for in Washtington D.C. Also crossing my fingers for “Butterfly Swords”. It’s a long shot, but I like having a horse in the race.
Judi Fennell’s GH listings: www.JudiFennell.wordpress.com
RWA National listings: www.rwanational.org
Listings throughout the day. Everything will be listed by 2pm Central time
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