What is the Baycon Writers’ Workshop?

It is an opportunity for aspiring authors to have professional writers critique their work based on story structure, plot, style and character development. It is conducted quietly in a small room with a limited group – the writers who have submitted work, the three professionals who have critiqued the work, one of whom will act as a moderator who makes sure the group stays on task and on time. This is not a competition or a bragging contest. Participants must be at least 18 years old, and able to accept criticism in a mature manner.

Submission criteria:

1. Stories must be either Science Fiction, Fantasy, Gothic, Horror, or have a fantastic element of some kind.
2. All submissions must be emailed to writers12@baycon.org no later than April 15, 2012.
3. Manuscript submissions can have up to 7,500 words. Manuscripts should conform to professional submissions standards. This means double spaced, with the header having your name, story name and page # starting on page 2. NO BLOCK FORMATTING!!!
4. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received, then you will need to resend it as something went astray. Please resend or contact the webmaster at webmaster at baycon.org.
5. Longer pieces or novels must include a summary with a writing sample (the beginning is preferred). The summary counts as part of the 7,500 words.
6. Authors must be pre-registered BayCon 2012 members. Manuscripts must be accompanied by your BayCon 2012 membership number or payment of an attending membership. If your name is not the paying member, you must include the name of the paying member. If there is a problem with this, we will assist.
7. If the piece of writing is a collaborative effort, then the team will be treated as "one author". To put it another way, you will be given the same total amount of time as an individual author. All present must have a Baycon 2012 membership to be present at the workshop.
8. Manuscripts must be emailed to writers12@baycon.org. Your manuscript must be in either Adobe Acrobat PDF or Microsoft Word Compatability Format. We will not be accepting hardcopies. This allows us to quickly email our professional writers, and saves us the cost of mailing the manuscripts. This makes the Workshop FREE OF COST!!
9. We will commit to finding panelists and panels for the first 15 manuscripts. After that, manuscripts go on a waiting list as we try to put together additional panels or find some way to accommodate the additional manuscripts. Manuscripts are first come, first served.
10. If for some reason, you need technical assistance, please let us know soonest at writers12@baycon.org so that we might help. My husband will happily assist you in converting your manuscript to an approved format. I do writing. He does computers. Our children will either learn to take care of the house or we will turn Grandma loose on them. Or have Wanda do her teaching mojo on them.

In the event we cannot get enough panelists or manuscripts we are currently negotiating with a Taiko drummers troupe willing to conduct public practices. We are also negotiating having the pipe band Men Without Pants join them.  At 3:00 am....... As usual, we ask that you do not make us turn them loose........

Deadlines are much closer then they appear - we'll need your work by April 15th, 2012!

Sandy Saidak aka Thing 1, BayCon Writers' Workshop