We hope that you are sitting down because today Inkubate officially announces our 2012 Literary Blockbuster Challenge. The prizes total $10,000 and a shot at publication for the best attempts at merging literary and commercial fiction.

This contest is inspired by the recent publication of James W. Hall’s, Hit Lit: Cracking the Code of the Twentieth Century’s Biggest Bestsellers. In his book, Hall outlines a formula for writing a mega bestseller.

Inkubate's Jay Gale and authors Sally Sloan and Evie King discuss the Literary Blockbuster Challenge in LA.

Write or Revise a “Hybrid” Novel: Inkubate and the panel of judges headed by Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jane Smiley, are looking for writers who have successfully blended a profound, well-crafted novel with a page-turning addictive read—think Moby Dick meets Jaws.

Judges: Joining Smiley on the panel of judges is Hall, Larry Beinhart (Wag the Dog and How to Write a Mystery), and prize-winning authors Jennifer Clement (President of PEN Mexico) and Martha Frankel (Hats and Eyeglasses).

Tell us about your Work: To supplement your novel entry, we invite you to visit InkubateVoices, our YouTube channel. Here, you may submit a short video (90 sec. to 3 min.) about your writing life and literary goals. This is an opportunity for you to tell us about your work—what influences you draw upon and what makes you tick—the story behind the story. Our goal is to give you a voice beyond the pages of your work and to turn the heads of industry professionals who will undoubtedly be intrigued by this venue.

Grow your Platform: These videos will be made public and we’ll invite viewers to share their favorites. We encourage you to use them to grow your platform and to direct your friends and colleagues to see you “live” on Inkubate!

Speak to Publishers & Agents: The videos are also a valuable tool for the publishing industry. Watching writers speak about their work provides publishers and agents a preview of how each author will engage with an audience. Publishers and agents have told us that they want writers who can market themselves and build successful platforms of their own. This is your chance to do just that.

Submit your Video: Writer videos may be submitted here: www.youtube.com/user/InkubateVoicesPlease note that all entries will become the property of Inkubate and we may edit them to ensure compliance with our standards of practice. You will see your video appear only after it has been reviewed and approved.

Submit your Novel: You may submit your novel to Inkubate through March 31, 2013. You will see the informational contest link on our homepage and you’ll find the submission link on your Writer Dashboard. If you have any questions, we are here to help. Contact Co-Founder, Stacy Clark at stacy@inkubate.com or 214-505-9953.

Good Luck!

We just returned from the San Miguel de Allende Writers Conference and what an event it was! From Margaret Atwood's Keynote address to the varied workshops offered by Judyth Hill, Susan Sutliff Brown, Sandra Gulland, Sarah Stonich, Mary Katherine Wainwright, Susan McKinney de Ortega, Franny Billingsley and many others, this literary fesitival was world class. We'll be posting highlights soon, but wanted to share this priceless photo of Canada's finest authors and educators: Merilyn Simonds, Margaret Atwood, Wayne Grady and Graeme Gibson! This photo was taken at Friday evening's sensational Viva Mexico Fiesta, held at the Instituto Allende. The following day, after our brief presentation to writers, Margaret Atwood graciously tweeted: "New site for aspiring writers, to connect them with publishers: http//www.inkubate.com. Cute idea!" We are so grateful for her generous gesture!

Stay tuned, as we have much more to share in the days ahead! 

Dear Inkubate Writers,

Here we are and it’s the middle of Hanukkah and it’s almost Christmas Eve, so we thought it appropriate to wish you all Season’s Greetings and best wishes for a Happy New Year.

Speaking of the New Year, we expect that Inkubate will be a very important part of the year for our community and, as we promised early last spring, the first quarter of 2012 should be full of news and important developments.

A great holiday gift to your writer friends would be to send them your unused invitations, which can be accessed on the bottom right-hand-side of the Writer Dashboard page. If you run out, please ask for more. If you're a writer who has not yet registered, please submit this form to get started: http://www.inkubate.com/Invitation/Request

We look forward to seeing you all next year at writer workshops and festivals. By the way, Inkubate is proud to be a sponsor of the upcoming 7^th Annual San Miguel Writers’ Conference. Beginning February 16^th, the international venue welcomes Margaret Atwood and Naomi Wolf as Keynote and Featured Speakers. Here is the link, in the event that you would like to attend: http://sanmiguelwritersconference2012.org/

Warm regards,

Jay Gale, Principal, Publisher Relations

Stacy Clark, Principal, Writer Relations

Thomas Obrey, Principal, CTO

Erik Dodier, Principal

In our most recent blog posts we’ve recapped the coverage that Inkubate has received from Publisher’s Weekly and The Huffington Post and we’re gratified to read such favorable coverage.

Both articles talk about the “slush pile” and Inkubate’s plans to digitalize it, thus transforming a burden into an opportunity. Though the term “slush pile” quickly helps industry insiders visualize the problem, Inkubate’s content discovery bears no resemblance to the unstructured, unclassified and hit-or-miss process that the industry has suffered with since the beginning. Instead, Inkubate has created a minable, raw resource of high quality writers and writing seeking a home.

It’s interesting that we have received frequent feedback from users of our site that Inkubate feels like a home. Terms like “inviting,” “safe,” “friendly” and “relaxing” have been shared online and last week, Columbia University’s Laura Costello wrote for EdLab that “Inkubate is clean, adorable, and simple to navigate.” Perhaps it’s the simplicity of our message and refinement of our design that attracts writers to sign on and post their work. Huffington Post Books Editor, Andrew Losowsky sees the appeal as well, writing on October 8^th that “Inkubate requires far less effort on the part of the writer…After all, isn't writing time consuming enough?”  

As publishers begin to inquire about, and use, Inkubate, they are discovering that streamlining writer submissions is just one facet of the sophisticated approach that we’re applying to the process of writer discovery and content provision for the publishing industry. We’re proud to stand alone as the welcoming online place for writers, publishers and agents to get back to the business of bringing great writers to market.

Huffington Post Books Editor, Andrew Losowsky, published a favorable story about Inkubate on Saturday morning. We are delighted to see this news on the heels of Publishers Weekly’s story.

Have a look and let us know what you think!

Here’s the link to the story: http://huff.to/oDBFpB

Earlier this week, Publishers Weekly ran a feature story about Inkubate’s innovative plans to pair writers with publishers, editors and agents. In “Inkubate Plans to Digitize the Slushpile,” Senior News Editor, Calvin Reid reported that the search tools we’re developing will enable subscribers to quickly identify literary works of interest. Publishing professionals use Inkubate to “Discover” content any number of ways, including by author, genre, literary form and writer-generated tags. Inkubate then helps them make contact with the author in a secure and copyright respectful environment.

At Inkubate we see our technology transforming the proverbial mailroom slushpile into a valuable, minable raw resource and we’re clearly not alone. Bruce Shaw, President and Publisher at the Harvard Common Press commented on Reid’s piece, writing, “I'm willing to give it a chance...if it is really well organized, and simple to see what is there (before delving further, if so desired), it could be very helpful...And I’m looking forward to seeing more and talking with them more about it.”

Many other industry professionals, including acclaimed authors, Dianna Hutts Aston and Betsy James, and literary editor & producer, Jody Feagan have concluded that our model just makes sense. Brendan DeMelle, Executive Director and managing Editor of DeSmogblog.com writes “Inkubate is likely to be a win-win for everyone.”

Consider, too, the growing demand for high quality content to feed the eBook business models of major publishing companies and it becomes clear that Inkubate is undoubtedly timely. After all, there simply are not enough editors or agents working in the industry to engage in the process of traditional “Discovery” while simultaneously managing the volume of new work that will be required to fill this emerging market. To remain competitive and relevant, publishing companies need to be able to differentiate their eBook content from that of the online aggregators like Amazon and Google and self-publishers, otherwise they will not be able to command the premium price points that curated works deserve. The sheer volume of eBook publishing that has publishers salivating (750,000 eBook titles in 2010 on top of the nearly 300,000 traditional books) makes it obvious that the old way of initiating Discovery just won’t be sustainable. Inkubate is the engine that will drive this emerging market.

We are excited to be the only company committed to building solutions for writers, publishers, editors and agents as they transition to meet the challenges (and opportunities) of a rapidly evolving industry.

Really exciting news!

INKUBATE has attracted the interest of one of the top six U.S. publishing houses and we'll be meeting with them again in late Sept. - early Oct.! They have expressed interest in our Children's, Y.A. & Adult manuscript categories.

So, please sign on and post your work! They’ll be looking very closely at these submissions over the course of the next several months, as part of our ongoing development and BETA testing. During the BETA test period, we will assist editors by making direct introductions to writers. We hope that this will maximize the value of INKUBATE to our early adopting writers, while we continue to build out the final INKUBATE structure.

Though INKUBATE will be acting as an intermediary to facilitate these introductions, we want to remind participants that INKUBATE charges no fees or commissions.

Stacy Clark and Jay Gale are looking forward to connecting with friends next week at the New Hampshire Media Makers Gala Event in Manchester, N.H. For information, contact the host of the event, John Herman at john.c.herman@gmail.com.

As we’ve received so many kind comments about Jay’s recent interview with Seacoast Business Connection Host, Mark Miller (Portsmouth Community Radio), we’re reposting the podcast link here.

http://www.inkubate.com/Content/audio/WSCA_07-11-2011_JayGale.mp3

Mark Miller can be reached at localart@comcast.net.

Stay tuned to Mark’s weekly broadcast (Mondays at noon) and check out our blog for regular updates.

In the meantime, if you have any questions, we’re here and happy to assist!

Stacy Clark: stacy@inkubate.com 

Jay Gale: jdgale@inkubate.com

INKUBATE is excited to announce that we’ll be meeting again, later this month, with a major U.S. publisher who has already expressed a keen interest in what we’re doing.

This milestone may mark the beginning of the transition of a publishing industry determined to reinvent itself. It’s very exciting that it was just a year ago, on July 1^st, when INKUBATE emerged out of the pouring rain in New York City – a great story in its own right, and best saved for later!

The efforts to liberate one writer’s work last year have blossomed. INKUBATE is a real place with real people who really care about the future of writing and the people who write.

On July 26^th, established author, Sheila Cull, blogged about her experience as an early adopter of INKUBATE:

There is a lot of talk in the publishing world about the new venture, Inkubate. So far, it appears a dreamy website where writers get to post published and unpublished work for prospective literary agents and publishers. In today's market, Inkubate could not have come along at a better time. More great news is that I've spent much time and consideration to make my profile shine. Inkubate will be unrolled for the industry in the coming weeks. Moreover, it doesn't cost writers a cent!  You need to be accepted by Inkubate (I was) and then the agents, publishers will pay if they want to read your scripts.

We hope that all of our early adopters will be as pleased as Sheila!

By the way, if you have international friends who would like to sign on, please let them know that they should use our Portsmouth, NH zip-code: 03801.

As always, if you have questions, we’re here to answer them!

Stacy Clark: stacy@inkubate.com

Jay Gale: jdgale@inkubate.com

Jay Gale recently traveled to network with several different types of writers’ groups, the first being the Cape Cod Writers Center, where Jay met 40 writers, each anxious to become a published author.

Traveling back north, Jay took advantage of being in Boston to attend a Trident Booksellers & Café author event on Newbury Street and later that evening, participated in a creative writing workshop sponsored by the Boston Public Library, where Jay got to exercise his own personal love of writing.

Before returning to Portsmouth, Jay enjoyed the best Mexican meal that Boston can offer at Beacon Street's Sol Azteca. It was just as good as it was twenty-five years ago when Jay stumbled in on a cold, wintery afternoon, while working as a hydro-geologist to save the world from itself.

Stacy Clark enjoyed meeting Washington Post Environmental Writer, Juliet Eilperin, at Brooklyn, New York's independent bookstore, WORD, where Eilperin discussed her book, "Demon Fish: Travels Through the Hidden World of Sharks." Eilperin also spoke at a Wildlife Conservation Society event at the Bronx Zoo's Center for Global Conservation. Later, Clark spoke with actor and screenplay writer, Alessio Bordoni, who expressed excitement about posting his next play on INKUBATE. 

It's been an exciting week!

Welcome to Inkubate, the site for writers, publishers and agents.

The idea is simple: create a fun, comfortable, appealing space where writers can catalogue their work. Populate that space with a diverse inventory of submissions and then invite editors and agents to easily search and browse the titles.

Engineered by a world-class creative team, Inkubate’s smart tools are designed to help you find your literary match online.

• Take our tour and see how easy and fun it is!
• Request an invitation to post your work.
• Create a colorful writer’s portfolio that helps get you noticed.
• Craft crisp synopses that grab the attention of publishers and agents.
• Upload a photo or image to help us get to know you.
• Add excerpts of your work and choose the categories and tags that describe it best.

To join Inkubate, simply submit a request for an invitation. If you’ve already received your invitation, we look forward to your posts. The more work you upload, the sooner we’ll be able to open the site to publishers and agents, inviting them to search for bold new writing.

That’s when things will really start to hatch.

Foster's Daily Democrat ran this story about Inkubate on June 6th: "Inkubate hopes to connect writers, publishers."