My name is Sara Bell, and I'm the vice president of Rainbow Romance Writers. We're the first and only GLBT branch of Romance Writers of America. Our goal is to give the thriving GLBT market a voice within mainstream romance. With that thought in mind, RRW is launching our first contest, The Rainbow Awards of Excellence (RAEs).
The object of the RAE's is to recognize outstanding GLBT romance writing regardless of the author's gender, sexual orientation, or RWA affiliation (or lack thereof). Any author who has had a GLBT romance published during 2009 with a valid ISBN is eligible. The entry fee is fifteen dollars per entry and authors need not be members of Romance Writers of America or Rainbow Romance Writers to enter. We'll be taking entries from June 1 through August 31. To cut down on postage costs for our entrants all entries will be in electronic format.
The RAEs will also be peer judged -- for authors by authors -- similar to the Grammys or the Oscars. Full details on the contest can be found here: http://www.rainbowromancewriters.com/2010/04/contest-2010-rainbow-romance-award-for-excellence-in-romantic-fiction/
Our hope is to bring the full spectrum of authors and publishers of GLBT romance to the table on this one, so if you'd please pass word of the RAEs on to your authors it would be deeply appreciated. I'm also the contest coordinator, so if anyone has any questions I can be reached via wavyscribe@aol.com Thank you for your time and we hope to see many of your talented authors enter The Rainbow Awards of Excellence.
Thank you,
Sara Bell
