Archives: Competion Rules

General: By accepting a prize, the winner releases The Friends and the parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, suppliers and agents from any and all liability for any loss, harm, damages, cost or expense, including without limitation property damages, personal injury and/or death, arising out of participation in this competition. If, for any reason, (including unauthorized intervention, fraud, technical failures, or any other cause beyond the control of The Friends which corrupts or affects the administration, fairness, integrity or proper conduct of this Competition), the Competition is not capable of being conducted as described in these rules, The Friends shall have the right, in their sole discretion, to cancel, terminate, modify or suspend the Competition.

One winner will be selected in each category and winners will have their work read by Penguin Random House Canada editors and will receive a page of editorial comment.

An attempt will be made to notify the Competition winner, if any, by telephone or mail no later than ______________. If the winner cannot be contacted, an alternate winner may be selected.

Nominees will be selected by judges chosen by The Friends and the winner will be chosen on the basis of the originality, creativity and writing skill of the submission. The decision of the judges as to the winner of the Competition will be final. The Friends reserves the right to cancel or modify the competition if, in the sole opinion of the editors, and insufficient number of qualifies Manuscripts are received.

All Manuscripts submitted:

• Must be original works of book length (no less than 220 typewritten pages or approximately 60,000 words) written in the English language
• Must be written solely by the entrant, who may not be the author of any previously Published Novel
• Must not violate any right of any third party or be libelous, and d) must generally follow the Guidelines below.

WHAT CONSTITUTES A PUBLISHED NOVEL: For the purpose of this Competition, a “Published Novel” means a work of fiction of at least 40,000 words in length that has been published or distributed, in part or whole, in paper or electronic format or in any other medium, excluding, however, self-published works. This does not include a chapter excerpt on an author’s website, subject to conditions that:

• The excerpt is the only text that exists for public viewing.
• The excerpt is not for sale to the public.
• Must not violate any right of any third party or be libelous, and d) must generally follow the Guidelines below.
• The number of words in the excerpt does not exceed 10% of the total number of words in the work as a whole. (The decision of the Competition’s judges as to whether or not an entrant or a Manuscript qualifies will be final.)

Entrants must have a valid e-mail address. In case of dispute as to identity of an entrant, entry will be declared made by authorized account holder of the e-mail address provided to The Friends. “Authorized Account Holder” is defined as a natural person who is assigned an e-mail address by an Internet access provider, online service provider, or other organization (e.g., business, educational institution, etc.) responsible for assigning e-mail addresses or the domain associated with the submitted e-mail address. The Friends are not responsible for technical, hardware, software, telephone or other communications malfunctions, errors or failures of any kind, lost or unavailable network connections, website, Internet, or ISP unavailability, unauthorized human intervention, traffic congestion, incomplete or inaccurate capture of entry information (regardless of cause) or failed, incomplete, or delayed computer transmissions which may limit one’s ability to enter this Competition, including any injury or damage to any computer relating to or resulting from downloading any materials in this Competition.

To enter, you must complete an online entry form and upload an electronic file of your Manuscript. A reading fee of $30.00 for each submission in the categories of (YA) and Murder/Mystery thriller, $50./00 reading fee for business book submission. To be considered for the 2016 competition, all submissions must be received by 11:59pm August 31, 2016

• Manuscripts must be submitted as a Microsoft Word document or PDFs. All manuscripts must be double-spaced, with pages numbered consecutively from beginning to end. All manuscripts must be saved as “Manuscript Title_Entrant Name.”
• Each entrant should keep a copy of the Manuscript for his or her own protection. The entry form is available HERE.

The Competition is open to any writer, regardless of nationality, who has never been the author of any Published Novel (in any genre), as defined by the guidelines below, (except that authors of self-published works only may enter, as long as the manuscript submitted is not the self-published work) and is not under contract with a publisher for publication of a novel.