An opportunity for every Indian blogger to get published!
IndiBloggers!
On August 15 2012, on our independence day and IndiBlogger’s 5th anniversary, comes an opportunity for every Indian blogger to get published!
IndiBlogger.in in association with HarperCollins will give you insight and a whole new perspective of the world of publishing. Submit your own stories, learn from the authors, talk to the editors, join a social community of book lovers and see your work in print.
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@Stories .. The result is NOT going to be out on April 30 .. It will take more time. We will inform everyone on the NEXT STEPS sometime in the first week of may :-)
Results by April 30th? That seems pretty quick. Any idea how many of the shortlisted ideas were submitted?
pooja, even I foolishly thought I could crunch down 7 years in 3000-4000 words, ignorant me....:P
Hahaha. 7years is little actually. I wanted to write the story about my Brother and Bhabhi. They were friends since Childhood but fell in love after 15-16years. Imagine putting that in 4000 words
Planning on it Ste. Have everything plannedWaiting for holidays so I can start
Rio, it depends too much masala and no meat makes for a yucky treat :)
It depends on the reader too how much spice he/she can handle
@Pooja : yea the time given to submit the idea and promote it was sooooo long compared to the time for actual story completion. Though I wrote my full story when I wrote the idea itself, I had to scamper my editing at last moment.
It was not that actually. I thought the 3000-4000word limit was too less. My story will never fitSo I backed out lol
Is it funny how I promoted my plot crazily, but finally ended up not sending the story?
I wouldn't allow anyone to slice it Rio. I would like it to be as it is. I'll find some other publisher, or go to Harper Collins indirectly
All writerz need to get past the editors, if they wanna get published.
Yes, but they wouldn't slice it offThey'll just make some changes and stuff.
I am surprised that most people had to cut down words. I am on the other side I had hardly 2200 words and brough it up to 2600+ but could not do more. So I left it. rules I guess say within 3000-4000.
Quite strange that it seems only I am on the other side, maybe I really don't have a big story to tell.
vaikunth, thoda mirch masala add hone se spicy treat hota for world to read.
Yeah! It would be a help if you said something like June 30th or July 31st - so that we can shelve this for the time being and get on with our lives
Well! Phase-II over and, up to now, we knew what were the timelines for the phases. Now is there no guideline ahead? Is there a date by which the next short-list of 50 gets announced? And, pray, what needs be done after that point by those lucky short-listed writers to get to the final stage?
I am surprised that there is no announcement about the number of stories received and the next deadline.
And it is still open like some of the contests in the past.
earlier they had to read just 500 words shorties...now they have to read almost 4000 wordies so I guess thats why they are taking their time.
feel like that nandini; been editing and editing and i don't know where to stop it; when to stop it, i should stop it at least before 31st march. god save me.
Yeah. That is why I did 2 rounds of thorough editing (almost re-wrote the entire story) for both my stories and then chucked it in and forgot about it.
did crazy chopping still 10 words left...my story is looking like a cyclone victim now :D
Editing is a skill. I was like found it difficult to bring my story to some 3980 from 4500. Indeed a difficult task! sigh!
In future, if you like, I can help you guys in editing. I have professional editing experience of 5 years Yeah, but i am bit harsh when it comes to grammar errors and punctuation errors (I simply don't get how writers can suck at writing), so most of the times my writiers hate me
Looks like it is so easy to have 'story ideas'. When it comes to actually writing the story, we all get stuck. Out of the 250 shortlisted ones, I'm sure not everyone will submit their complete stories by the deadline. I'm not submitting my second story. Too complicated. Hope that makes the final shortlisting easier with fewer entries. *fingers crossed*
writing is not so difficult....its editing and snipping it to a word limit which is more tricky
seriously i can relate with ranjit and anukriti... And i have around two stories to complete... And the word count is driving me crazy..... wish they could extend it by few days :-/
will 78 extra words make a difference @Renie :P
And i would be travelling on 31st :(.. since am in the USA the time zone is an other concern for me...
ok coming back to the word count would 78 extra words make a difference... am trying to reduce it though :(
i have extra 100 words and i'm just too confused how to chop it...my odd little story will become more odd if i were to snip it :/
75-100 words is not too difficult to remove. You don't have to remove any content to remove 100 words. If you just read through, you will find sentences you can reword and remove 4-5 words. Just do that for 20 sentences and you get rid of 100 words withour losing content.
I know i am bit late but for future reference, in this types of cases, using American English is perfect. It will chop away unncessary prepositions and things like that.
Don't worry about the wrong word count - we'll use the same word count as MS-Word when we verify the stories!
Panic attack! : Is the last date 31st March? If possible, please extend the date.
what were you doing all this time?? sleeping??
Not sleeping. Was very busy with work. Have completed half the story. Its not that I can't finish the story by Sunday, it is just that a few more extra days would be good.
ok all the best
So how many of you out of the 250 have submitted your stories? I'm still stuck on my second one. It is turning out to be a novella. Not able to get it within the word limit :(
I've started writing it an hour back. And I've forgotten what my actual story was!
A very happy anniversary :)
Thanks Anoop for your highlight. Taking a cue from what you suggest, I think I can do better.
Hey all,
regarding the word count: It is a short story, so its a challenge in itself. 3000 - 4000 is the maximum word limit. We will look into the word difference issue, so for now, a 100 odd word difference should be fine.
Even if you feel you have completed your story, It would be best if you keep making improvements until the last possible moment.
Below is a comment that I made on the GetPublished forum; I am sharing that here,
"Also, a note to all, Writing is a very serious process. If you are keen on getting published. I would suggest that everyone seek professional help if possible either online or through some established short story authors. Short story writing is a very tough art so getting your friends and family to read your finished story and give you suggestions may not be a bad idea. You will have to get used to some harsh critics though :-). The final stories that you write will be read by trained eyes with many years of experience and a story may not be picked for reasons that we cannot fathom, so we must be thorough.Millions of stories are sent to publishers in India and very few make it. We have better odds I suppose. There are about 25 days left and that's all the time left to put together a story that is well written, so please do take all the help you can get and write down your masterpiece."
Looking forward to reading your story and Godspeed!
Hi, anoop,
I submitted my post, Word count is 3445. on the submission page it is 4168. why is this difference, it is not only me others are also facing the same, see the above comments. please resolve this, do not send us panic at this stage. :)
is my mc office different than others??...in my ms word it shows higher count and in submission window it shows lesser, while for others in ms word shows less and submission window it shows more!???
I need help from the admin, my story may shoot up to reach 4500 words. Please tell me if its acceptable, because if its not then I may have to shorted things a little, may compromise on the quality then. It would go a long way if anyone from indiblogger or harper collins could help me with it.
I had the same issue. Had to struggle hard to squeeze it into word limit. But somehow managed. Let us see what they say.
Hmm ! I too faced similar issues. It is difficult to refine the story at a point when you feel that everything is perfect :D I found it difficult too.... :D
I had a small issue. In MS Word, my story word count shows as 3993 while in the submission window it shows as 4057. Don't know what is the issue. I hope that does not lead to disqualification of my entry.
i had opposite issue. in ms doc it showed 4000 but the submission window it showed 3889...so i thought to type some more but now in ms doc when i checked it shows 4126 whereas in submission window it shows 4002....so which word count is right???
HI I am also having the same problem.On my Word the count is 3445. on the wubmission window 4168.
I think the indi bloggers should tell us something about it. that is clearly a technical error. but it can send you panic, at this time.
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