Submissions OPEN June 1-7!

HOORAY!

Our team of volunteer judges will be accepting manuscript submissions from JUNE 1-7th. Submit by midnight (EST) on June 7th to get a free critique rating this month.

As usual, and we can't stress this enough, read the submission guidelines again just before you submit. We appreciate it!

All Best,

The Rate Your Story Team

P.S. Remember that ratings are subjective, just like the actual submission process to publishing houses and agents. Feel free to re-submit a manuscript up to three times to get a different perspective from another judge. Good luck!

Submissions Update!

Good news, folks! We think all submissions from May 1-7 have now been read and rated. Watch your inboxes sometime today or tomorrow for those to be returned!

And join us next week for an interview with one (possibly two) RYS users who have gotten agent or editor contracts recently. It's always exciting to hear those success stories.

Thanks for your patience and look forward to earring from us soon!

Best,
RYS

BIG NEWS!

Happy Wednesday!

You've probably been wondering. . .where's Miranda?

Well, she's been busy preparing a final exam for her high school students (who have 10 days left of school.).

AND. . .

She's been downstairs in her secret laboratory mixing up a super-secret-super-potent-awesome-tasting-magical concoction to help other people learn how to revise their picture book manuscripts so that they scream to editors, "I'm a super-stellar writer!"

Well, the secret's out!  Soon, The Picture Book Academy be doling out vials of launching an e-course called THE GRAMMAR GROOVE.

Mwah! Ha! Ha! Ha!

Miranda Paul's secret ingredient to making grammar fun? Silliness, sprinkled on top of hot-cross puns.

Learning grammar for professional writing is hard, tedious, and overwhelming. OR at least it HAS BEEN in the past. . .

Miranda Paul and Mira Reisberg have created a course (launching soon!) that teaches children's authors what they really need to know about grammar and style, and what they can sort of skip over (don't tell the editors she said that!). With Miranda’s expertise as an English teacher and picture book author, combined with her hilarious “voice,” and Mira’s expertise in pedagogy, course creation, and children’s literature, this course is a “must have” for anyone who ever wonders where to put that comma, quote, apostrophe, em dash, etc. If you struggle with English or have gotten SPAG issue comments on a manuscript (or your manuscripts continue to get form rejections or no response), this may be the workshop for you.

BUT. . .other than creating an awesome course that will help you get your SPAG issues out of your picture book manuscript (no matter how you submit it—electronically or via printed copy), Miranda's got one other piece of BIG NEWS:

RATE YOUR STORY IS OPEN TO SUBMISSIONS AGAIN!

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAA!

However, please note—Because of the overwhelming popularity of our free critique rating service and the number of manuscripts we receive (which put a heavy demand on our volunteers at times), we will be creating a "monthly window" for submissions. 

Beginning this month (May 2013), we will be open for submissions during the first seven days of each month only. Submissions received between 12:01 a.m. Central Time on the first day of the month and 11:59 p.m. Central Time on the 7th of each month will be read and rated for free. We will be closed during all other times of the month. 

If this helps us keep our inbox at a level we can handle, we'll look at modifying it. But, for the rest of the summer and into the fall, we're going to try this schedule. Thanks for understanding, and we look forward to getting your MSS!

By Julie Rowan-Zoch