by Stephanie Morrill
I was completely blown away by how many entries we had for the Go Teen Writers first lines contest. We had – are you ready for it? – a whopping
411 entries!!!
411! It’s almost too big for me to comprehend. I’m not a math person, as we all know. Our first Go Teen Writers contest had, like, 32 entries or something. Which was great considering at the time it felt like we had about 12 readers. Including my mom.
Anyway. Because of the wonderfully overwhelming number of participants, here are some things I wanted to pass along to you:
- 411 entries means there are a lot of words to read. Even though it’s just one sentence, we’re dedicated to providing feedback to every entry, and that means this will probably take a bit longer than our other contests. Even if our judges got everything back to me tomorrow, there’s a lot of emailing to be done. Please be patient with us and know that we’re trying our best to work quickly.
- Instead of having a “Top 20” we’ll have a “Top 41.” The Top 41 will (likely) be announced on Wednesday, January 16th.
- Then the judges will be trying to decide what they feel are the top 3. That will take another few days, I would imagine, depending on their schedules.
- I will email your feedback as quickly as possible to the email address you provided on the form. If winners have been announced but you still have not received your feedback, feel free to email me and let me know.
Phew. I think that’s it. Thank you SO much to everyone who entered. These contests are really fun for us, and I hope you find them to be a valuable, encouraging experience.