The Project
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Emergents, in association with Fraser Ross Associates, Scotland’s leading literary agency for children’s writers, is launching a search to find Scotland’s best unpublished fiction for readers aged between 7 and 12 years old.
Writers currently living in Scotland can submit their work to the project (entry is free of charge and multiple submission is accepted).
Emergents, in association with Fraser Ross Associates, will select the most promising work to develop for submission to publishers. The selected writers will be given guidance and feedback, and there will be a meeting with Fraser Ross Associates and Emergents to discuss the work, its commercial potential and how best it can be taken forward.
Writers living in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland may also be offered professional critical reading and/or mentoring through Emergents’ programme of Talent Development.
The most promising work submitted may also be offered representation by Fraser Ross Associates.
The selected writers will be contacted with a view to arranging a suitable time for a meeting in Edinburgh with Fraser Ross Associates and Emergents in July 2014.
What we’re looking for…
- Strong commercial fiction for children aged between 7 and 12 years
- Page-turning stories that you can’t put down, which stay in your head long after the book is closed
- ‘Stand-alone’, i.e. complete in themselves stories, not ‘first in a series’ - although the potential to develop into a series might be there
- Robust plotting with compelling characters
- A strong narrative voice
- Good writing that reflects a clear understanding of the intended readership
- Any fiction genre – contemporary, realistic, comedy, fantasy, historical, sci-fi, graphic novel etc.
- Any setting - any time, any place in the World or out of it
- International sales potential
Make us sit up and pay attention!
Rules and eligibility…
- Writers must be resident in Scotland.
- Only novels that are complete and at the final draft stage should be submitted
- Completed novels should be no more than 60,000 words long
- The work must be unpublished and the writer’s own original work
- If the work is under consideration elsewhere, the writer must inform the project organisers
- Closing date for submissions: Monday 9th June 2014
How to submit your work to the project…
Submission to this project is via e-mail. Please answer the questions below in your e-mail, and then attach your work to the e-mail. We are very sorry but we are unable to accept postal or other printed submissions.
Please send your completed submission/s to:
[email protected]
Your e-mail must include the following sections, submissions that do not answer all of these questions asked or supply the information requested will not be considered:
- Name
- Postal Address
- e-mail address
- Title of the work submitted
- Synopsis of the work including plot summary and word count - but totalling no more than 1000 words - please attach to the e-mail as a .doc or pdf
- How complete is the work? Is it a working draft or do you consider it complete?
- Which other authors would your readers be likely to read? Please supply up to three author names and books titles of their published work
- Have you previously sent this work to an agent or publisher? If so who, when, and what was there response?
- Your writing CV - tell us about your writing and what, if anything you have had published before? You can attach a writing CV in .doc or pdf format
- Please confirm to us that the work submitted is your own work
Attachments - these must be either in .doc or pdf format. We are sorry but we cannot accept submissions in other formats. Please make sure that your attachments do not exceed a combined, total size of 2mbs.
Project timetable…
To enable writers to develop work for the project the submission period totals four months.
Submissions to the project close on Monday 9th June 2014.
Two online video forums will be timetabled to enable writers to discuss any issue relating to the submission process and their work, the first will be in late February, and the second at the beginning of April 2014 - watch this space for details - or join Emergents newsletter to receive details directly to your mail inbox.
Emergents & Fraser Ross Associates will be reading submissions throughout the submissions period.
Please note…
We are very sorry but due to the large number of submissions our projects receive we are not able to offer feedback on all submitted work.
We will only contact writers whose work is accepted by emergent and Fraser Ross Associates for possible further development. The last date we will be contacting writers is Monday 23rd June 2014.
We are only able to provide financial support for travel to writers attending meetings connected with this project if they are resident in the Scottish Islands, and subject to status. Please contact us for further details.
The decisions made by Fraser Ross Associates and Emergents are final and we are not able to enter into correspondence about decisions or work that has not been selected for further development. Submission to the project is your sign of acceptance of these guidelines.
Assistance with submissions…
If for any reason you have any queries or problems submitting your work, please contact emergent -
There will be two online forums available to answer specific questions (watch this space for details), and questions may also be sent to:
[email protected]