Update #13: No, your sisterwives can't come to your job interview with you

Unless you have a co-author, YOUR name should be the only name in your email address.

HoneyAndSonnyButtonweazer@skinemax.com as an email address is great if you are BOTH the authors of the novel you're sending out to agents.

Otherwise, just you: Sundance Smith.
No Mrs. No Mr. No one else.

Having two names on the email is akin to having your spouse/s come along on a job interview.

You wouldn't do that would you?

Not unless you were interviewing at Harlequin.  Meet Mr. Shark:

Update #12--a chance for some audience participation!

The first round of judging is finished.

No, it didn't kill us.  Close, but we found an extra cupcake and an extra flask hidden in a desk drawer and it kept us going through #410 (there have been some disqualifications and withdrawals, so we're down to 410 entries)

It's very clear that we're going to have a VERY hard time picking a winner. Thus, we've decided to torture the finalists in new and hilarious ways for our judging pleasure.  We're going to give them a quiz!  (Can you hear the sound of maniacal shark laughter here?)

Here's your chance to contribute:  what should we ask them?  Nothing too grim, nothing too personal, nothing too weird.  Think about if YOU were to be a finalist; what questions would make you stand out from the crowd?

Post your suggestions in the comments column of this blog post.  You'll see which ones we pick when the finalists are posted (it's a ways off!)

And if you want to guess how many entries made it to the second round, post that number in your answer as well.

Example: 410 entries.  Question: Are you afraid to eat lunch with a shark? (Lunch with The QueryShark herself is part of the contest prize)

Have at it!

update #11

There's nothing like a nice yummy slice of pie or cake after a delicious dinner is there? 

Here, choose one:

No, wait, you have to look at these too!

And don't forget cookies! Cookies are delicious!

Chocolate chip cookies and milk? Honestly, that's almost perfection right?

Now, choose one.

Ok, two.

No more.


That's our job on the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Debut Novel contest.  As we read the entries it's clear it's not a question of sorting good from bad.   Every entry has merit.  And honest to god, if you know nothing else about me, you know if it was crap, I'd be the first one to tell you. And make you spell it correctly.

Despite all your foolishness of single spacing and incorrect pagination; even despite the hurling locomotives that have another THINK coming---every writer who entered is a good writer. The entries don't resemble the slush at all.  They resemble finalists in writing contests I've judged over the years for MWA and RWA chapters.

This is making me very unhappy in the best possible way.

Adrienne Rich has died

"For The Dead"


I dreamed I called you on the telephone
to say: Be kinder to yourself
but you were sick and would not answer

The waste of my love goes on this way
trying to save you from yourself

I have always wondered about the left-over
energy, the way water goes rushing down a hill
long after the rains have stopped

or the fire you want to go to bed from
but cannot leave, burning-down but not burnt-down
the red coals more extreme, more curious
in their flashing and dying
than you wish they were
sitting long after midnight

from BryantMcGill

Notice of her death in the LA Times

Update #11 #10**-proof reading with Mr. Spell the Czech

I'm finding some real oddball phrases in your manuscripts:


If she wanted to draw my foul, she'd have another thing coming


Retched world.


hurling locomotive

I'd of known him 

fare skinned



Finding these before you send a manuscript on submission (or to a contest) is a Very Good Idea. I'm assuming you know, once you see these highlighted, that there are errors.  The trick is to get rid of of them BEFORE I see them.

Two strategies:

1. Let your manuscript sit for at least a week.  Don't fiddle with it, don't look at it, don't open it, don't  do anything.  Let it sit. Then go back with fresh eyes. It's even better if you can do this twice.  Print it out and read it with a ruler under each line.  This forces you to see every word. When you see the words that are wrong, then you fix them.

2. Read your manuscript out loud.  This can take a couple days.  You'll pronounce the words, realize that "think" and "thing" are not the same and fix them.  I'd have known him is I'd've not I'd of.

Here's why this is important: words are your tools as a writer. When you use them incorrectly, it's not unfair for those of us on this side of the process to use that to evaluate how you write.  Also, this is one of the things you have TOTAL control over.  There are lots of factors in getting published that you don't have any control over.  Don't sabotage yourself by hurrying.



**yes there is a good story about this.

Update #9 AIEEEEE!!!! oops

I've spent a lot of time this week shrieking about mistakes you've made and tearing out my hair about it.  High entertainment value I know...for you and my colleagues who have taken to buying earplugs and vats of chamomile tea. The SharklyAssist has taken to hiding under her desk when steam starts coming out my ears.

Today however is different.

Today the shoe is on the other fin.

Today are the mistakes *I* have made...so far.

Here's the first:

As you know I hate prologues. With an almighty passion. Almost as much as I hate anachronisms.  So when I read a query letter that said 1810 historical mystery and the first sentence of the manuscript had the words "plastic soldiers" I figured "prologue". Skim skim skim.  Pages go by. L. Ron Hubbard makes an appearance.  What the almighty font is going on here?

I start to email the author: I think you sent me the wrong manuscript.

I start a blog post: Huff! Puff! Check your work!!

Pause.

Oooops.

I notice the name at the end of the query is NOT the name attached to the entry number.
I have pasted the WRONG query to the manuscript.

Back into the gmail archives. Aha! Yes indeed. There is the correct query.
Cut/paste/upload revised mss to Dropbox.

Delete email.
Delete blog post.

Whew!



Here's the second:

I see "I lay in the gutter" in the first page of a manuscript.
Misuse of lie/lay/laid makes me CRAZY. I see it all the time.

I start a blog post with AIEEEEEEE and prepare to flay you all for misuse of "lay"


Pause.


Oooops.


That is the correct use of the word lay.

I emailed the author just to share my pain and humiliation.


Look, we're all in this together.  You make mistakes. I make mistakes. Nobody is going to die over lack of a doublespaced manuscript (well, not until I am Queen of the Known Universe and then WATCH OUT!) and no one is going to lose their access to the internet over a stupid email email address or signature. Reformatting manuscripts isn't going to actually kill me (if it could, I'd be dead now.)

The hard part is both behind us and ahead.  Behind us in that the hard part is writing and finishing and polishing a novel. And you did that. Sure some of the formatting needs work, but you wrote, and finished and polished a novel. That ain't small potatoes.


Ahead of us is sorting out finalists. From what I'm reading here you've done some brilliant work and how to choose the winner is going to be a daunting task. Sufficient to say, it's not going to be based on whether you doublespaced or where you put your page numbers or even what you chose as a file name for your manuscript.

Unless of course it was JanetReidIsAQueryBunny.doc

Then all bets are OFF.

Update #8: No TOC in the manuscript of your novel

Nooo!

Don't do it.

Do NOT put a table of contents in a novel you send on submission (unless of course who ever requested it wants one.)

Here's why: it requires formatting, and every bit of formatting you put in that doesn't transfer has the potential of gooping up your manuscript.  It doesn't matter if chapter 6 starts on page 3000 if I can't actually read the pages.

Second, I'm reading electronically starting at the front and proceeding apace.  My Kindle doesn't even recognize page numbers.

Third, I'm reading electronically so I'm going to use a search function to find a chapter, or a word, not the TOC.

Fourth, unless you have it set to automatically adjust when the font/layout is adjusted, it will be wrong if I change the font to something other than yours, and fix the margins.***

Notice on the photo above that the Epilogue starts on page 229 according to the TOC.
Now look at the bottom: page 3, Sec 1 3/205. That means there are only 205 pages in the document.

That's because I changed the font from Courier to Times New Roman. And that means your TOC isn't useful at all.


There's no compelling need for a TOC in a novel submission.  Leave it out.

You should also leave out: dedications, acknowledgements and notice of copyright.  All that is added in at a later stage (AFTER the book is sold, and edited.)


***NOT TO MENTION DOUBLESPACE THE DAMN THING...oh wait, was I shrieking?

Update #7: Your email address and signature

It's no surprise that getting 400+ entries into the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Debut Novel contest made me hyper aware of your email address (each address was logged into my address book with your entry number) and your signature line (we're pasted your query onto your manuscript to create one .doc for the judges so I see all those sig lines.)

Some of you must be getting paid by your email provider for advertising space right? Otherwise why would you allow them to advertise products on your business email?

53 Year Old Mom Looks 33
The Stunning Results of Her Wrinkle Trick Has Botox Doctors Worried
 <http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL3242/4f6161b8c7cea27de9a4st06duc> consumerproducts.com <http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL3242/4f6161b8c7cea27de9a4st06duc> 

Unless you are writing a novel solely to amuse yourself, and have no intention of ever showing it to anyone else, you need to start thinking about the business side of your writing life.  An email account that is businesslike (kitten30@hijinx.com isn't); an account that doesn't spam your recipients with advertising links; and an IP address that isn't your other business/job (doctor@gallbladdersareus.com)



 There are many parts of this business you have no control over:   response times from agents leap to mind; the state of the market; my mood.  You have total control over how you present yourself. Exercise it.

Update #6: What fresh hell is this?

You enter a contest.
You are asked to send your novel as an attachment.
What do you call it?

Here's the right answer: Title by Author
For those of you without enough coffee yet that means: (your book's) TITLE by (your name cause you are the) AUTHOR.

Got it?

Here's a short list of some of my favorite things you sent:

For Janet Reid.doc

Pay It Forward Contest Entry.doc (cause yanno, there's only one entry--yours, right?)

Author and Novel dotdoc.doc (seriously?)

Author/novel Draft 3 (cause you wanted me to know it's not the first draft?)

Author/novel and date you finished it/date of draft


In other words a lot of you call this thing something that helps YOU figure out which version, or when you finished or where it's going.  That is looking at this from the wrong perspective.  Think about it from the perspective of the person GETTING the manuscript: your name, your title are the only things that will distinguish this from the 400+ entries we're organizing (yea there's a reason I spent 16 hours assigning numbers and this is it).


Next time I do this, I swear the list of instructions is going to be a mile long but it never crossed my mind that every single person sending a ms would get it wrong.


(and for those of you who are gnawing your fingernails with worry, don't.  No matter what you call the thing, we're reading it.  And too many of you are really REALLY good writers.)

yes

it's here

Friday Night at the Question Emporium

I hope you don't mind that I'm sending you this email. [Would you] be willing to address something for all of the clueless writers in the world. *You know, when you aren't reading 416 contest submissions, representing your current clients, and saving the world of course.

Ok, so ... For a newbie like me, it's very discouraging to keep running into road blocks like "its best if you meet me at a conference." In my personal case, I can't afford most of the conferences, I missed the most recent one in SF, and the next one that is even somewhat close to me is sold out. So, I've had to chalk those particular agents up to 'never going query.'

Now, in a seemingly opposite point of view, I follow a lot of agents on Twitter, and a couple of them have been tweeting about all the authors that are randomly approaching agents at Bologna, as though it is a VERY negative thing. Having never been to a conference, I have no idea what it even looks like, so I could be way out of line in saying that isn't that conflicting information? "You must only meet me at a conference. However, don't you dare approach me." I'm confused. (Now, that's not to say I would condone interrupting an agent's night out for sushi, but randomly approaching an agent in the hallway OF the conference seems the only option.) Right?

Again, I've never been to any conferences, so maybe they have a specific 'meet and greet' type of thing that I'm unaware of. But seeing how agents are unhappy about this happening right now in Bologna, maybe many authors are confused like me. (Who knew!?) I thought, maybe, just maybe you'd drop some knowledge on us, and possibly save the sanity of a fellow agent in the process. :-)

There's a key piece of information you don't have yet: Bologna is NOT a writing conference. It's a trade show. So is BEA. So is ALA (American Library Association).

That means that agents are there to work their REAL jobs: selling.  They are not there to meet/help writers.

The same is true for some fan conventions like Bouchercon and Malice Domestic. 


When an agent says they like to meet authors at conferences they mean writing conferences like:

CrimeBake
Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers
Grub Street's Muse in the Marketplace
PennWriters annual conference
Backspace

Those are places that pay my expenses to attend (BEA, ALA, Bouchercon and Malice do not) and in return, I offer my time and knowledge to the attending authors.  I prefer you not pounce on me with your novel, but it's an ok place to say hello and expect as pleasant a response as I'm capable of (varies by hour of the day.)


Now back to saving the world.

Perfect sentences

Perfect sentences in a place you might not have expected.

We really need to stop shooting our children

Of course I'm following the story of Trayvon Martin. 

Here's what perplexes me about the response of law enforcement:

1. A man in a car reports suspicious activity.
2. He's told to not engage with the person he's reporting.
3. He gets out of the car
4. He engages with the person he's reporting.
5. He shoots the person.

How is this self-defense and imminent peril?
How exactly is this guy not arrested?
He shot someone. An unarmed someone.  On a sidewalk he went to in order
to confront this person.

Leave out all the details.  Race,  age,  body size.  Leave it all out, and it still boggles my mind that there's any question of self-defense.

And if for any reason you're still thinking "well, maybe there's another side to this story" think about these two things:

Would the police have handled this differently if a black man got out of his car, shot a white kid on a sidewalk and claimed self-defense?

What if it had been your kid?


Gina Carroll says what's in my heart. Just a lot better. 


President Obama: "If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon"

Do you have time to think?

I find for myself that my first thought is never my best thought. My first thought is always someone else’s; it’s always what I’ve already heard about the subject, always the conventional wisdom. It’s only by concentrating, sticking to the question, being patient, letting all the parts of my mind come into play, that I arrive at an original idea. By giving my brain a chance to make associations, draw connections, take me by surprise. And often even that idea doesn’t turn out to be very good. I need time to think about it, too, to make mistakes and recognize them, to make false starts and correct them, to outlast my impulses, to defeat my desire to declare the job done and move on to the next thing.

I used to have students who bragged to me about how fast they wrote their papers. I would tell them that the great German novelist Thomas Mann said that a writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. The best writers write much more slowly than everyone else, and the better they are, the slower they write. James Joyce wrote Ulysses, the greatest novel of the 20th century, at the rate of about a hundred words a day—half the length of the selection I read you earlier from Heart of Darkness—for seven years. T. S. Eliot, one of the greatest poets our country has ever produced, wrote about 150 pages of poetry over the course of his entire 25-year career. That’s half a page a month. So it is with any other form of thought. You do your best thinking by slowing down and concentrating.

--William Deresiewicz

The complete text of Mr. Deresiewicz's remarks
to the plebe class at West Poiont is here in The American Scholor

(hat tip to Miss Molly O'Neill)

Where do you put the page numbers? -answer

There are only two REALLY wrong answers and those are:
(1)on the page top, and
(2) on the page bottom.

If you do that and the pagination changes (such as when I reformat your ms to have doublespacing, 1" margins, TNR not Courier, and remove all the pretty graphics) you end up with p. 32 somewhere in the middle of the text on page 61.  And that my writer friends is NOT something you want.

The correct answer is lower right footer.

Here's the answer in lovely graphic form to show rather than tell:

and certainly not on the top of the page

Or on the bottom

NOTICE IT SAYS **FOOTER**

Now, if someone wants it done to their own specifications you follow their directions. But if you just need to do it right in absence of instructions, this is the way.

There's a reason this is the correct way: if a manuscript is printed out on paper for any reason, and it's in a stack, and you need to find page 62, you flip through the pages to find the right one. Where do you look?  Upper left hand corner? Sure, if you're writing in Hebrew. Upper right? Well, OK, I guess, but try it.  (It's awkward as hell) Lower right footer is the easiest and most natural way to flip through pages IF you are right handed.  Thus it is the industry norm.


Any questions?

I thought not.

Fortunately you all write a whole lot better than you format. Reading your entries is really cutting in to the amount of time I have to lallygag around tormenting the minions.

Update # 5 --and a quiz!

Where do you put page numbers on a manuscript?

Here's a quiz!

Remembering

I love riding my bike in NYC.

This photo is from the Memorial Ride yesterday that draws attention to the bicyclists who were killed in the previous year. At each place where a cyclist died, a ghost bike is installed and for a minute, the bicyclists raise their bikes in the air.

It's a powerful and moving moment.

Particularly when it's six blocks from your front door and at the intersection you use every day.

photo by Andrew Hinderaker

4th Update on the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Debut Novel Contest

So, you're trying to make me crazy right?

Is there any other reason you wouldn't double space your manuscript? I can see you in your Secret Writing Lair, logged in to the Secret Author Cabal online forum hatching up this plan of Agent Doom.

In fact, I googled, and there's a picture of it:

If it had been one or two of you, I would have chalked it up to novices, and thought no more about it.

It's more than 10% of you. And that's a lot when you're talking 400+ entries.***

Manuscripts are ALWAYS double spaced. The ONLY exception is if there is an instruction saying to NOT double space.  Double spaced is the default. The standard. The norm.

Right now, I'm doubling down on the scotch as I reformat.

And the next contest?  I'm going to make you run a qualifying heat in formatting before you get to enter. It's AMAZING some of the whackadoodle things you guys do in manuscripts.



***There are no disqualifications for format foolishness. Don't fret.

3rd Update on the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Contest

All the entries have been processed. That means I've opened them, numbered them, and uploaded them to DropBox so the judges can read them.

It also means that if your entry was disqualified for any reason you will have gotten an email from me.

However, I know your little writerly souls and I know that's not going to assuage your worry.  Writers obsess over details and if you're not obsessing over the right word, you're obsessing about whether your contest entry was ok.

So, let's at least get you back to obsessing about words.

You can email me to make sure you've got a contest number.

You MUST email me this sentence: "Do I have a number?" and it MUST be from the same email address you used to enter the contest.

No long rants.
No effusive praise.

Nothing but "Do I have a number?" from the same email address you used to enter.

My reply will be that number.

Ok?

2nd Update on the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Contest

We've had our first disqualifications and it's already too many! We hates this!

Your manuscript must be readable which means I have to be able to open it and the words can't be gibberish.

Three manuscripts didn't meet that criteria today.

If you don't work in Word you've GOT to make sure that when you send a .doc that it will cross platforms.  I know a lot of you hate Word. That's fine. Just make sure I can read what you send when I open it in Word.

And double check the size of your .doc file. Anything that's over 2MB probably has something wrong. My word processing program rejects it as too big to open--that makes it unreadable. A manuscript for a contest like this should NOT have graphic files in it. No pictures, no diagrams, nothing.

When something is unreadable, we try a couple alternate forms of opening and converting. We don't just throw it away after one try.  If you get an email saying your entry was discarded, it's not cause we just threw in the towel after one attempt.


If your entry is disqualified, I will email you to tell you.  Right now we're sorting, and uploading to DropBox.  We're going in chrono order so if you entered at the last minute, you won't hear anything for awhile. (As of tonight, we've done half the entries--if you entered before 3/10/12 you would have heard from us)

Update on the Liz Norris Pay It Forward Debut novel contest!

The contest closed at midnight 3/16/12.  Only one person (so far!) entered after the deadline and had to be turned away.

Other interesting stats: 2 people  3! people had to withdraw because they received offers of representation after sending their entries. That was fun news!  Congratulations!

Almost everyone got it right: query in the body of the email, manuscript attached.  I was very glad to see that.

Only about half of you have ever read QueryShark and thus know not to put your address or mine at the top of an electronic query letter.  I was very sad to see that!



Here's a graph of how the entries rolled in:

We have 416 entries!

We've polished our spectacles, laid in a supply of coffee, bourbon and cupcakes, entered the 24-hour sushi delivery bar on speed dial, and we're

READY TO READ!

So, how was your day?

Lunch here at the Reef usually just involves jousting over who ordered the spicy tuna sushi and who did NOT and thus better get her mitts OFF mine, but today we had Entertainment with a capital E initiated by our good friend Eric over at Wiley. 

He tweeted a link to this NPR story about an earless rabbit. 

You only need to read the headline to know it's not a happy story: "Star Rabbit Dies When Photographer Takes Wrong Step."

I read the story aloud to @SharklyAssist a darling of an assistant who loves animals. She was horrified. I of course couldn't stop laughing to her great and growing dismay.  Yes! It's awful, but holy hell...it's awful funny too!

I tweeted about it.

And @SharklyAssist announced to all and sundry that "Words cannot cure what ails you" (which is oh so true) and here was her response to me:

Which of course produced a link to Disapproving Rabbits from Bill Cameron which is clearly a place I need to do more Christmas shopping.

But the whole point of this blog post is to announce we have a new standard for measuring how the day went.  How bad was it? Well, at least you didn't step on the bunny!

The titular head of my defenestration committee

Titles!
Hang on a second while I leap out the window to a fiery end on 7th Avenue please!

Ok, ok, you're right, I'd probably just bounce off all the pedestrians staring at the great round orb that has recently returned to the NYC skies.

Back to the reason for my window ledge excursion:

Titles!
Book titles!

I have several books almost ready to go out on submission and all of them need new titles.  I'm staring into space muttering things to myself such that the Sharkly Assist gives me her trademarked raised eyebrows and not-so-furtively reaches for the butterfly net:

Good titles aren't make or break items but a good title --the RIGHT title-- sure doesn't hurt. Thus my mutterings and grumblings.

I like to pick a phrase from the book, and when I read a novel I make a list of some of the words I think might work.

And then there are the times when the author has an idea and I have an idea and together we have:

And then there are the times we have a title and one of us decides it should be something else. #oops. It's not a good idea to change a title mid-submission so the new title has to be amazingly better than the old one. And even then I don't like to do it (it drives editors bonkers and makes it harder to track email conversations and submission records).  I want to come up with the right title BEFORE I go out on submission.

So, when you need a title, what do you do? I'm not above stealing your tricks of the trade for my own nefarious purposes.

Huh?

Just this morning a writer sent me a requested full manuscript in a chapter-by-chapter attachment.  One email (thank all deities large and small) but containing 17 attached files: one for each chapter.

Of course I wrote back and said: "One file to rule them all by gollum, and don't you forget it my preciousssss."

But I'm deeply perplexed by this strategy. It's akin to sending one chapter per envelope by snail mail.

I can't think of a single reason that you'd ever do this unless the agent specifically requested it.  Sending individual chapters means I have to open each file, copy and paste each one into a master document, make sure I got ALL the files, redo the headers and footers, make sure the pagination is correct and then save it. Am I EVER going to do that? Sure: if you're #1 on the New York Times Bestseller list and are my client.  And that is IT.

If you've got any insight into why writers do this, I'm interested in hearing it.

Bullseye

There is an oft-quoted line from Chekov: "One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it."  The corollary is: If you fire a rifle in the third act, it better have been shown to us in the first.

Which means: there needs to be a set up for plot points, particularly those points that are the resolution of the plot.  Proper set up means that even though the reader says "aha!" they don't say "where the hell did THAT come from??" (or if they do, they can re-read to find the answer.)

This is a helluva lot harder than it looks and an author who does it with elegance and subtly is a skilled marksman indeed.

If you want to see a gorgeous example, look no further than BENT ROAD by Lori Roy.  BENT ROAD is nominated for an Edgar Award in the Best First Novel category. Since my Fabulous Client Steve Ulfelder is also nominated, I wanted to read all the books in the category.

BENT ROAD is not a novel I would have picked up if left to my own devices, which may be proof positive that I am an idiot.

BENT ROAD is an amazing novel. And my appreciation of the artistry of the author increased about an hour after I read it when, standing in the shower, I remembered a scene in a cafe.  I won't tell you anymore about it because I want you to experience that book like I did. Read it with raw eyes.

Then, if you are a writer, go back and read it again and watch how Lori Roy sets all the pieces in place.  Once you know, you'll see it.

The Top 20 of Miss Universe Slovak Republic 2012 will be selecte

Road to Miss Universe Slovak Republic 2012



Miss Universe Slovak Republic 2012 continues at full swing! Recently the final casting to select the Top 20 competitors of 2012 took place in Bratislava, and soon their names will be revealed.

Special thanks and credits to GlobalBeauties& Fotoavideosk

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://freedom-guy.blogspot.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)

Valeria Voronova, 20, from Sevastopol, was crowned Miss Earth Crimea 2012

Road to Miss Earth 2012



Valeria Voronova, 20, from Sevastopol, was crowned “Queen of Crimea 2012 ” or Miss Earth Crimea 2012. She is a student of Sevastopol National University of Nuclear Energy and Industry.


Special thanks and credits to GlobalBeauties

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://freedom-guy.blogspot.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)

MISS Swaziland Ayanda Dube will compete in Miss World 2012

Road to Miss World 2012



MISS Swaziland Ayanda Dube will compete against contestants from 127 countries in the Miss World contest to be held on August 18 in Ordos Inner Mongolia, China.

The last time this African country had competed in Miss World was in 2009.

The small landlocked nation of Swaziland started being represented in Miss World back in 1975. In 1986 it celebrated a historic result in the pageant: not only Ilana Faye Lapidos was a semi-finalist, but she was also declared Africa’s Queen of Beauty that year.

Ayanda Dube, Swaziland’s entry in this year’s Miss World, was crowned last year.


Special thanks and credits to GlobalBeauties

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://freedom-guy.blogspot.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)

Callie Walker was crowned Miss Alabama's Outstanding Teen 2012 - She will represent Alabama state at the Miss America's Outstanding Teen 2013 Pageant

Road to Miss America's Outstanding Teen 2013


Callie Walker was crowned Miss Alabama's Outstanding Teen 2012. She will represent Alabama state at the Miss America's Outstanding Teen 2013 pageant, scheduled for August 14-18, 2012 in Orlando, Florida.

TOP 5
* Miss Alabama's Outstanding Teen : Callie Walker
* 1st Runner Up : Hannah Brown
* 2nd Runner Up : Bria Kalpen
* 3rd Runner Up : Caroline Pettey
* 4th Runner Up : Madge Ellis

TOP 10
* Susanna Bagwell
* Hannah Brown
* Mary Kelly Cantrell
* Madge Ellis
* Brooklyn Holt
* Bria Kalpen
* Caroline Pettey
* Lenze Morris
* Makenzie Roberson
* Callie Walker


Top 15
* Hanna Bowlin
* Ashley Peyton
* Sydney Slaughter
* Myrah Taylor
* Anna Thigpen

Special thank and credits to boutstandingteen.homestead.com & us-beauty-pageant.blogspot.com

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://freedom-guy.blogspot.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)

"Scandal in sandals" sounds soooo naughty!

That's the Australian edition of IONIA SANCTION by Gary Corby. In case you're not Down Under, there's an American edition too:

New Shelf Awareness Giveaway

And honestly, if you aren't already subscribing to Shelf Awareness you're missing the single best resource for publishing news and book reccs.

Looking for a way to get some attention for your work?

Bad Situations

The next installment of the innovative Tandem Reading Series will be at 5pm this Sunday, March 11. Brooks Sherman, associate agent at FinePrint Literary Management, will moderate a reading and panel of works of crime fiction. Performing, we have...

Dan Krokos, reading from his yet-unpublished adult thriller THE BETTER GUY, in which an addict ambulance driver spends his nights driving the getaway car for his uncle, a contract killer; and Jen Conley, reading about an eleven-year-old boy who ducks, hides, and tries to survive the brutal hold-up of a convenience store.

Following the panel, there will be a reception with wine and refreshments.

As ever, the Tandem Reading Series is held at the Cell Theatre, 338 West 23 St. (between 8 and 9 Ave.; take the 1, C, E to 23rd St.; www.thecelltheatre.org <http://www.thecelltheatre.org> ). 212-989-7434. Donation: $5. Or you can hand in a story; if we like it, we’ll invite you to read at a later date.

Hope to see you there!

19 year old Elizaveta Golovanova is the winner of Miss Russia 2012 held on March 3, 2012 at the Barvikha Luxury Village Concert Hall in Moscow

19 year old Elizaveta Golovanova from Smolensk won the title and the expensive crown of Miss Russia 2012 during a pageant held last March 3 at the Barvikha Luxury Village Concert Hall in Moscow.

Elizaveta Golovanova stands 1.78m tal and was crowned by Miss Russia 2011, Natalya Gantimurova and the reigning Miss World 2011, Ivian Sarcos of Venezuela.

Besides wearing the USD 1-million crown, Elizaveta Golovanova will have the right to represent the country in Miss World 2012 on August in Ordos, Inner Mongolia in China, and in Miss Universe 2012 competition on December.

Miss Russia 2012 1st run-up was Kristina Gontar, while the 2nd run-up was Alena Shiskova

Anastasia Pominova from Voronezh was chosen as the winner of the popular vote, conducted by Woman magazine.

More photos:





source: (Thank you and credits to
http://www.universalqueen.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)


Miss Russia 2012 is Elizaveta Golovanova, 18 years old, from Smolensk. She is 1.78 m-tall. The beauty was crowned during the 20th anniversary of the country’s biggest pageant, on March 3rd.

The new Miss Russia received the sash from the hands of Ivian Sarcos, Miss World 2011, who was a special guest at the pageant’s 20th anniversary edition; and was crowned by Miss Russia 2011 and Miss World quarter-finalist Natalya Gantimurova.

In addition, Anastasia Pominova from Voronezh was chosen as the winner of the popular vote, conducted by Woman magazine.

The new Russian beauty queen will wear the crown worth USD 1-million during her year of reign, and will represent her country in Miss World 2012, in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China, on August 18; and depending on the results, she will also participate in the 2012 Miss Universe pageant, in December.

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://globalbeauties.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)



Miss Russia 2012 MOSCOW, Russia - Elizaveta Golovanova (18, 1.78m, Smolensk) was crowned Miss Russia 2012 at the Barvikha Luxury Village Concert Hall in Moscow. She will represent Russia in Miss World 2012 in Ordos, Inner Mongolia on August 18 and in Miss Universe 2012 on December. Kristina Gontar was the first runner-up and Alena Shiskova was the second runner-up. The event featured the current Miss World, Venezuela's Ivian Lunasol Sarcos Colmenares, as one of the judges.

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://www.timesofbeauty.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)


Miss Russia 2012, Elizaveta Golovanova

Photos of the crowning moment of Miss Russia 2012 Elizaveta Golovanova. Elizaveta Golovanova from Smolensk Region was crowned Miss Russia 2012 on March 3rd, 2012. She is 18 year old and stands 5’10″. She will represent Russia in Miss World 2012 and Miss Universe 2012 Pageant.

Photos courtesy of KP.ru, EPA/YURI KOCHETKOV, Missology.

Do click here for more photos and news

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://beautypageantnews.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)

Pantaloons Femina Miss India 2012 will be held on March 29, 2012 - Meet the contestants

Pantaloons Femina Miss India 2012 will be held on March 29. The top 20 contenders for the coveted crown have been announced, and the winner, who will be elected on March 29, will compete in Miss World 2012, in Ordos, China.

The shortlisted 20 finalists are:

Aasttha Ssidana

Delhi

Erica Fernandez

Mumbai

Farah Hussain

Ponda, Goa

Himakshi Agarwala

Guwahati

Ipsita Pati

Vishakhapatnam

Karuna Dogra

Ghaziabad

Nikita Dutta

Mumbai

Prachi Mishra

Pune

Priyanka Verma

Jaipur, Rajasthan

Purva Rana

Dharamshala

Rochelle Maria Rao

Chennai

Ruhi Singh

Jaipur

Sana Khan

Mumbai

Shamata Anchan

Mumbai

Sneha Upadhyay

Mumbai

Sonam Pachey

Gangtok

Sonampreet Bajwa

Mumbai

Sukalpa Das

Guwahati

Vanya Mishra

Chandigarh

Vidhi Bhardwaj

Mumbai

Special thanks to feminamissindia.indiatimes.com

source: (Thank you and credits to
http://freedom-guy.blogspot.com/
and all sources for the information and pictures)