BOB Contest

ANWA BOB Contest

Every year, ANWA hosts a Beginning of Book (BOB) Contest for all in-person and online ANWA Conference attendees, published or unpublished. Participants enter the first 500 words of a manuscript. All entries must be original and not previously accepted for publication or production at the time of submission.

*Ineligible: All 2023 ANWA conference committee members, 2023 ANWA conference instructors and agented authors are ineligible to submit an entry for the BOB contest. Registration for the BOB Contest is a separate event and NOT included on the conference registration form.

Who may enter

All writers registered for the ANWA 2023 Writers Conference, published and unpublished, may enter. *Ineligible: All 2023 ANWA conference committee members, conference instructors, and agented authors are ineligible to submit an entry for the BOB contest.
All entries must be original and not previously accepted for publication or production at the time of submission.
The conference committee members responsible for BOB are required to maintain anonymity of the judges and the competitors.

Prizes

Prizes will be awarded at the 2023 ANWA Conference on Friday, September 23, 2023.
All entries will receive critiques from three separate judges and emailed directly to the contestants within two weeks of the conclusion of the ANWA Writers Conference.
First, Second and Third place winners of each category receive a cash prize.
Grand prize for 2023 donated by Eshler Editing,
Mystery Prizes (donations by sponsors and generous community members).

How to enter

You must register for the in-person or online conference before you enter the BOB Contest.
All entries due by Midnight on Monday, July 10, 2023 (MST/AZ time). The fee is $15 per entry.
Email entries to: bobcontestsubmissions@americannightwriters.org.
You will receive a personal response once your entry has been logged by those mananging the BOB Contest.
Submit the first 500 words ONLY.
Submit your BOB entry as an e-mail attachment, .doc or .docx format.
Style Guide: Times New Roman, 12pt, and double spaced.
Entries not submitted correctly before the deadline will lose points or may be disqualified.
The subject of your email should include: Your name, TITLE of your work (in all caps), and Contest Category (Genre.) Example entry: Annie Anwa, THE BEST MANUSCRIPT EVER, Young Adult Fantasy (Urban Fantasy).
Your document should be submitted and saved with the TITLE (in all caps), and Genre.
Please remove any mention of your name from the actual manuscript portion of the attachment.
*OPTIONAL* Once you’ve submitted your entry, let everyone know by saving one or more of the buttons below and posting to your social media!
Note: The same submission cannot be entered into multiple genre categories in a single contest year. However, you are welcome to enter more than one submission into the contest.

Terms & Conditions

Conference Committee reserves the right to disqualify any entry it believes contains obscene, offensive, or inappropriate content.
Conference Committee reserves the right to combine categories due to insufficient numbers of entries or split categories due to a high volume of entries.
This is a double blind contest, where the authors don’t know the judges names and the judges don’t know the authors names.
Entrants must be current on-line or in-person conference attendees to place and receive prizes.
Entrants who cancel their conference registration after the submission deadline will still receive critiques, but will be ineligible to place.