• Café Life is the Colony's main hangout, watering hole and meeting point.

    This is a place where you'll meet and make writing friends, and indulge in stratospherically-elevated wit or barometrically low humour.

    Some Colonists pop in religiously every day before or after work. Others we see here less regularly, but all are equally welcome. Two important grounds rules…

    • Don't give offence
    • Don't take offence

    We now allow political discussion, but strongly suggest it takes place in the Steam Room, which is a private sub-forum within Café Life. It’s only accessible to Full Members.

    You can dismiss this notice by clicking the "x" box

Search for a Storyteller

Pamela Jo

Full Member
Blogger
Joined
Oct 26, 2021
Location
Wexford, Ireland
LitBits
0
Not a competition but a call for submissions. Anyone know more about the publishers?

Calling children's writers!
SEARCH FOR A STORYTELLER - open submissions competition
David Fickling Books are looking for a special new storyteller. Could it be you?
Storytellers are at the very heart of what we do at DFB. We are thrilled to be opening the doors of our Storyhouse for a limited time, to new, un-agented, un-published authors. For this competition, we’re delighted to be partnering with Arvon: a brilliant charity that supports writers by running creative writing courses, events and writing retreats.
Arvon will be helping us look for and nurture a new author who we can build an exciting creative partnership with; someone who we can help thrive; someone who has stories inside them that we can help bring to the world.
For the month of February 2024, we will be accepting unsolicited submissions in our Search for a Storyteller.
WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR:
David Fickling Books and Arvon are looking for a writer with huge potential who wants to grow and hone their skills. Someone who is passionate about bringing new stories to readers over a sustained career and who is inspired by the prospect of editorial development. We want to hear from writers who have stories burning inside them, who can write in new and unique ways, who can make readers feel seen and recognised. We are open to all genres, all styles and all voices, aimed at readers between 8-19 years old.
PRIZES:
The winning author will receive:
Several editorial sessions with David Fickling Books’ editorial team
Full access to an online Arvon at Home writing course
A publishing contract with David Fickling Books
Shortlisted authors will receive an editorial report on their submission.
We regret that we cannot offer feedback to all entrants, but thank all submitters sincerely for being bold enough to enter our competition.
WHAT TO SUBMIT:
We ask writers to email storyteller@davidficklingbooks.com and attach, all in one Word document or PDF:
A brief cover letter (1 page maximum; in one paragraph please tell us a little about yourself, include a paragraph pitch for your story and in no more than 200 words let us know what you would gain/value from editorial feedback and a further writing course)
Synopsis (1 page maximum; please do include spoilers!)
A full manuscript. If possible, please format the document in Calibri font size 12, 1.5 line spacing. The header should contain your name and the title of the manuscript. Each page should be numbered. Please use similar clear formatting if these specifics are not possible for you/you aren’t using Microsoft Word.
HOW TO SUBMIT:
Please send your cover letter, synopsis and full manuscript to storyteller@davidficklingbooks.com. Entries will be accepted between 00:00 1st February 2024 - 23:59 29th February 2024. Entries sent outside this timeframe will not be considered. There is no submission fee.
ENTRY T&CS
You must not have had a full-length children’s novel commercially published in any territory
You must be over 18
You can be based anywhere in the world, but the manuscript must be written in English
You must not have a literary agent
You can submit if you have submitted unsuccessfully to other open submission competitions, or if the manuscript has been rejected by agents
You cannot submit a manuscript that is currently under active consideration by an agent (or a publisher)
The story must be your own original work
Your story cannot previously have been published via Kindle Publishing and/or available on Amazon
Your story must have a target readership between ages 8-18
Entries will be accepted between 00:00 1st February 2024 - 23:59 29th February 2024. Entries sent outside this timeframe will not be considered
Only one entry per person
 
They are bona fide. An imprint of Scholastic that broke away to become independent (when so many choose the opposite route!). Arvon writing courses are long established and well known. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. :)
 
Good to know. The examples I looked at looked a bit comic bookish. Though for a series nothing wrong with that.
Bunny vs Monkey is a very well known series. Originally published while under the Scholastic banner. I'm assuming they've kept with DFB. Scholastic mainly do books from MG to younger. The branching into YA may be new for DFB (I don't know).
 
Back
Top