Enjoying the Benefits of Writing Contests

Are you trying to start a career as a freelance writer? If so, you might want to consider participating in writing contests in order to help establish a name for yourself and to gain experience in the writing field. In fact, there are many benefits that participating in a writing competition can provide to anyone that is interested in starting a career in writing or who simply wants to find a way to make some extra cash from home.

Get Experience With a Writing Competition

One great benefit to participating in writing contests is the fact that you can gain a significant amount of writing experience while participating in the contest. By following the contest rules and taking time to craft a quality piece of writing, you will learn more about your personal strengths and weaknesses in writing. This way, you can improve your skills and become a stronger writer.

Get Exposure When Participating in Writing Contests

Even if you don’t win, simply participating in a writing competition can help you gain exposure. First, the person or people reading the essays may be impressed by your writing style or may like your writing voice or tone. As a result, you may be contacted by those individuals to complete writing projects for them.

Even if you are not contacted by someone involved with the writing competition, your piece may still be published along with other entrants in the competition. As a result, someone else may see your writing and be impressed by your style. Or, when contacting potential clients for jobs they have available, you can refer to your published piece as a sample for those potential clients to read. Not only will these potential clients see a fine piece of writing that you created, they will also see that your piece has been published. Published pieces are even more impressive to potential clients than pieces that have not been published.

Gain Confidence and Make Money

If you do win some of the writing contests that you enter, you will certainly gain a boost in your confidence. After all, it feels great to win contests – particularly when it was your own personal talent that helped you win!

In addition to the confidence boost that winning a writing competition can provide, you can also win some money or some great prizes. So, if you want to put a little extra money in your pocket, participating in writing contests can be just the way to do it!

This is the second book in the wildly popular Southern Vampire Mystery urban fantasy books written by Charlaine Harris. This book opens with our heroine, the lovable, plucky, Sookie Stackhouse, finding the dead body of a friend in the backseat of the local police detective’s car. Because the detective in question was at home at the time of the murder, it’s obvious that the body was killed at a different location and placed in the car.

Sookie learns that her friend had recently attended a local sex party. She thinks the members of that group might know something about her friend’s murder so she starts “snooping” by using her special mind reading talent. Since Sookie works at the local bar she’s afforded lots of opportunities to hear what the locals are thinking.

In the meantime, Bill Compton, Sookie’s vampire boyfriend, informs her that she’s been summoned to Dallas to help the local vampire leader find his missing brother. Sookie doesn’t really have a say in the matter since she’d promised to do the vampires a favor previously in exchange for the lives of several humans. Therefore she and Bill head to Dallas.

It’s here that Charlaine Harris provides additional insight into the modern day vampire world she’s created. In order to get to Dallas Bill must fly in his coffin on a special airline, Anubis Air, which specializes in transporting vampires across the country. Sookie is on the same flight but sits in the passenger area of course.

Once they arrive in Dallas she’s approached by a human who attempts to abduct both she and Bill. Fortunately, this occurs after dusk and Bill is able to save them. This encounter proves to be more important later in the book.

Bill and Sookie make their way to the Dallas vampire leader’s house to learn more about his missing vampire brother. By reading the minds of the humans that last saw the vampire she’s able to discern that a radical religious group called The Fellowship of the Sun is involved. This group “encourages” vampires to repent their sins by “meeting the sun”, a ceremony heavily attended by Fellowship members; the setting is reminiscent of public hangings from the Wild West. These people are dangerous. However because the Dallas vampire leader is understandably concerned about the welfare of his brother Sookie volunteers to visit The Fellowship the next day with the human boyfriend of one of the Dallas vampires.

This proves to be a big mistake.

The next scenes involve abduction, assault, and murder. This is where Charlaine Harris’ action-adventure writing skills really shine. These scenes are intense, heart-wrenching, and thoroughly entertaining. Sookie accomplishes her mission but at a great cost to herself and other humans and vampires. The ordeal concludes with an ethical disagreement between she and Bill which results in Sookie’s return to Bon Temps alone.

Although still distraught over her argument with Bill, Sookie returns to daily drudgery of waitressing at Merlotte’s, the local Bon Temps bar. She’s soon approached by a local who invites her to an adult sex party.

Since her friend’s killer still hasn’t been caught she agrees, but brings Eric Northman, the Shreveport vampire leader, as a bodyguard. The resulting scenes between Sookie and represent some of the funniest dialogue I’ve read in an urban fantasy book in a long while. It’s nothing short of hilarious.

Overall Charlaine Harris does a great job combining drama, romance, action, and comedy into a fast paced, entertaining storyline. Although this represents the second installment in the series it works well as a standalone book, due in part to Charlaine Harris’ fantastic character development and world building.
About the Author

To see these characters on the small screen check out HBO’s True Blood series which is based on Ms. Harris’ urban fantasy books. The first book in the vampire books series recently topped the NY Times Bestsellers List.

Urban Fantasy is a loosely defined term to describe fantasy novels that take place in modern, often urban settings rather than imaginary realms. Some of the more popular authors of this genre are Charles de Lint, Neil Gaiman and Emma Bull. It is, however, a quickly growing field, so there are many newer and lesser known books and authors out there.

In some ways, Urban Fantasy overlaps with horror and tales of the supernatural, which are also usually set in modern times. Fantasy, however, while it can be dark, usually focuses on creatures and circumstances that are very different from the everyday, but does not indulge in fright, gore or mayhem for its own sake.

Although, like many readers, I was introduced to the fantasy genre by books such as The Lord of the Rings, lately I have come to prefer urban to more traditional fantasies. I think this is because with this type of book, there is the interesting juxtaposition of the everyday with the fantastical. I see it as the literary equivalent of surrealism, where ordinary objects are placed in very unusual or bizarre positions.

I think the popularity of urban fantasy is related to television programs and movies like the Twilight Zone. In these shows, people start off in completely ordinary circumstances, but something very strange then occurs –creatures from other worlds appear; a person goes back or forward in time; objects take on a life of their own; they find themselves in a completely unknown environment (as in the movie, The Cube).

Imaginary worlds like Tolkien’s Middle Earth are certainly fascinating. However, with urban fantasy, the reader can immediately relate to the environment in which the characters reside. This also adds an additional challenge to the author, who has to find a way to transform the everyday and mundane into the unknown and exciting.

Faeries and other denizens of Otheworlds are popular characters in urban fantasy. This is probably because they represent the borderlands separating the known from the supernatural or fantastic. While creatures such as faeries and elves were traditionally found in nature, today we are beginning to imagine them existing in previously unthinkable places, such as shopping malls.

Urban Fantasy also has the appeal of helping us imagine a more interesting world just below the surface of our everyday one. It suggests that, in order to experience something very different, we don’t necessarily have to visit another planet or dimension. It may just be a matter of shifting our focus and seeing the world around us in a new way.

I just received an email asking:

“I am currently looking for a Urban Fantasy writers mentorship program? Do you know of any?”

I personally do not know of any “mentorship programs”. However I am posting this here for some other readers to comment on. so please…
I would love if I could get some feedback on the comments here of people that know of some mentorship programs in their areas.
Please list as much information as you can.
Thank you!