Inspired by a Twitter conversation with children’s book author and illustrator Diane Dawson Hearn:

Real Simple magazine is hosting its Second-Annual Life Lessons Contest.

First prize: publication in the magazine, win round-trip tickets for two to New York City, hotel accommodations for two nights, tickets to a Broadway play, and a lunch with Real Simple editors; and $3,000.

Deadline: September 7, 2009. 1500 words max, can be sent by e-mail or snailmail. Limit one entry per person or e-mail account. Open to U.S. residents only.

You can find the full contest rules on the Real Simple website.

Please note that Inkygirl only promotes writing contests with no entry fee.

Cheerios is promoting a children’s book contest, with a deadline of July 15th. Entry must be an original story for a book for children ages 3 to 8. Only open to U.S. residents, and NOT open to anyone who has been paid for their writing (make sure you read the full contest rules).

The grand prize: $5000 cash, plus “the Grand Prize winning story submission will be offered to a reputable Children’s Book Publishing company for possible future publication. Publication not guaranteed.” Two first prizes of $1000 will also be rewarded. Here’s the registration form.

Please note that I only list writing contests in Inkygirl if they have no entry fee.

I’ve been listening to podcasts and audiobooks more frequently in the past few months. I put everything on my iPhone and then listen to them while I’m doing housework, running errands, or while I’m out for a walk or run. I love Mur Lafferty’s I Should Be Writing (”The podcast for wanna-be fiction writers by a writer who’s still learning”) podcasts and videocasts. She talks about her own writing as well as that of other author; she also offers inspiration and tips for those interested in writing fiction, especially hopeful writers.

Focus is on science fiction, but her advice can often be applied to many other genres as well. Plus I love her sense of humour.

You can download the podcasts from iTunes, or listen to streaming versions on her website, also accesible through http://isbw.murlafferty.com/.

You can also find Mur Lafferty on Twitter at @mightymur.

I’ll be mentioning more podcasts for writers in the future. If you have a favourite writer-centric podcast, please post about it below!

Please read these rules before entering.

C.S. Lewis, received over 800 rejections before he made his first sale.

Lewis’s works have now been translated into more than 30 languages and have sold millions of copies over the years.

C.S. Lewis Quotes:

What you want is practice, practice, practice. It doesn’t matter what we write (at least this is my view) at our age, so long as we write continually as well as we can. I feel that every time I write a page either of prose or of verse, with real effort, even if it’s thrown into the fire the next minute, I am so much further on.

I am sure that some are born to write as trees are born to bear leaves: for these, writing is a necessary mode of their own development. If the impulse to write survives the hope of success, then one is among these. If not, then the impulse was at best only pardonable vanity, and it will certainly disappear when the hope is withdrawn.

Want to find out about other famous author rejections? Visit Writers & Rejections: Don’t Give Up!

Sources:
Examining The Resilience Of Responding To Rejection
Rejected! by Scott Nicholson
C.S. Lewis Wikipedia entry
Great Writing Quotes - BitterSweetLife

John Kennedy Toole was an American novelist from New Orleans, Louisiana.

Toole sent the manuscript of his novel, Confederation of Dunces, to Simon and Schuster in the early 1960s and despite initial enthusiasm about the work, S&S eventually rejected it, commenting that it “isn’t really about anything.”

After Toole’s suicide in 1969, his mother convinced author Walker Percy (then a faculty member at Loyola University New Orleans) to read her son’s manuscript. Percy loved it, and LSU Press did an initial printing of 2500 copies in 1980.

A year later, in 1981, Toole was posthumously awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The book has now sold more than 1.5 million copies in 18 languages.

Want to find out about other famous author rejections? Visit Writers & Rejections: Don’t Give Up!

Sources:

Survival of Rats by Michael Allen (PDF)
Wikipedia entry