Are you Paula, Randy, or Simon?
The Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest is often compared to American Idol, but of course ABNA isn't nearly as famous, and the judges are entirely anonymous. Now, however, the judges are YOU! Amazon has announced the three finalists and opened the voting. The reading public (well, those with an Amazon account, in any event) will pick the winner.
The winning author is guaranteed a publishing contract with Penguin, but since Penguin editors selected the three finalists, presumably these are all books that Penguin is willing to publish. Ergo, it's highly likely they will all be published. In a nice display of genre diversity, one is a mystery (the author classified it under "general lit" but if your story is about unraveling the truth of what seems like an accidental death or suicide, that's a mystery in my book), one is a YA fantasy, and only the third is mainstream.
If you want to vote, you don't get to read the whole thing, only the beginning. You download the novel excerpts as if they were ebooks (the link for that is on the same page as the “older reviews”), but the cost is always zero dollars. If you have a Kindle, you can upload the files once they're downloaded (don't see why Amazon doesn't make Send to Kindle an option!). You can also read not only customer reviews (mostly either family, friends, or other ABNA entrants), the Publishers' Weekly review, and the comments by an editor, an agent, and two well known authors. If you do that, you really should read the excerpts to see if you agree. The authors, especially, pulled no punches.
You only have a week (until May 21) to cast your vote. Unleash your inner Simon and vote!
The winning author is guaranteed a publishing contract with Penguin, but since Penguin editors selected the three finalists, presumably these are all books that Penguin is willing to publish. Ergo, it's highly likely they will all be published. In a nice display of genre diversity, one is a mystery (the author classified it under "general lit" but if your story is about unraveling the truth of what seems like an accidental death or suicide, that's a mystery in my book), one is a YA fantasy, and only the third is mainstream.
If you want to vote, you don't get to read the whole thing, only the beginning. You download the novel excerpts as if they were ebooks (the link for that is on the same page as the “older reviews”), but the cost is always zero dollars. If you have a Kindle, you can upload the files once they're downloaded (don't see why Amazon doesn't make Send to Kindle an option!). You can also read not only customer reviews (mostly either family, friends, or other ABNA entrants), the Publishers' Weekly review, and the comments by an editor, an agent, and two well known authors. If you do that, you really should read the excerpts to see if you agree. The authors, especially, pulled no punches.
You only have a week (until May 21) to cast your vote. Unleash your inner Simon and vote!