Guest blogger Dream about the Love Inspired Historical pitch session

Camy here, and I'm happy to host my friend Dream, who is guest blogging today about the Love Inspired Historical pitch session! The picture above is me and Dream in this awesome British High Tea restaurant in Denver, Colorado.

And now, here's Dream!

Good morning, friends in Seekerville! I'm so excited to be joining you today, especially because I'm offering some of you a chance to finally escape Unpubbed Island! Well, okay, I can't personally make any offers, but I do have a wonderful opportunity to share with you.

For those of you who don't know me, I'm Dream, and I'm one of the hosts on Harlequin.com. I mainly work on the Love Inspired area, and I spend a lot of time chatting with authors and would-be authors as well as our readers. In fact, some of your Seekers (waves at Camy and Cheryl) hung out with me there long before they were published. It's been fun watching my friends on this incredible journey.

Which leads me to the great opportunity. Love Inspired Historical is having an online pitch session via Harlequin. Over the past several years, Harlequin has been committed to changing the unpubbed status of our members to published! We've had close to 60 of our online pitchers go on to sell the book they pitched in our chat room. What makes this newest opportunity unique is that this is the first time Love Inspired Historical has ever offered an online pitch.

Here are the basics:

If you have a completed manuscript targeted at Love Inspired Historical, you can enter the editor pitch challenge.

Out of all the entries received, senior editor Tina James will choose her five favorite, and those five entrants will be selected to join us in a special online chat where those entrants will each spend time talking with Tina about their books.

If you think you've got what it takes, you can find the full details on Harlequin.com here: http://community.eharlequin.com/forums/write-stuff/editor-pitch-challenge-steeple-hill-love-inspired-historical
I also encourage you to join our community, where we have a lot of great folks who love Love Inspired books. You can find our community here: http://community.eharlequin.com/forums/steeple-hill


Some specific tips:
1. DO make your log line and synopsis compelling. Be sure to hit on the key elements in the story, including your characters' goals, motivations, conflict, and of course, the romance!
2. DON'T leave the ending a surprise. Make sure it's clear how the story ends.
3. DO take the time to make your entry shine and have others read it before you hit send.
4. DON'T send an entry that's not targeted for Love Inspired Historical. Check the guidelines to be sure.
5. DO try!! You never know, this could be your big break!

I'll be here all day to answer your questions about the online pitch process, as well as anything else you might want to know about our community. The only caveat I'm going to issue here is that I'm not an editor. I work from home (mostly in my jammies), so I have no access to anything in our editorial department. I can't answer anything specifically about your stories or ideas.

Thanks for coming! I've got a basket of Love Inspired Historicals to give away, and we'll draw a winner from everyone who comments. Winner announced in the Weekend Edition.

You can also find us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/LoveInspiredBooks), Twitter (LoveInspiredBks), as well as on Shoutlife, MySpace, and Goodreads.

--Dream

Camy here: Thanks so much for guest blogging with us, Dream!

Camy Tang writes romance with a kick of wasabi. Out now is her romantic suspense, Formula for Danger. She runs the Story Sensei critique service, is a staff worker for her church youth group, and leads one of the worship teams for Sunday service. On her blog, she ponders frivolous things like knitting, running, dogs, and Asiana. Visit her website to sign up for her quarterly newsletter.