Idea Idol Competition

Do you have an award-winning book idea?

Enter WriteMentor’s competition for ideas right from the early concept stage, judged by agent Katie Blagden.

Ideal Idol is open internationally to any unagented writers of Picture Books, Chapter Books, Middle Grade, Teen, and Young Adult fiction fiction of any genre.

All you need is a pitch and a first page, or three spreads for Picture Books.

Entry is £5, or for £20 you can receive feedback from our team of experienced authors about both your entered pitch and page to give you some guidance before you grow your idea into a full-length book. You can enter as many times as you want, across all age groups.

If you reach the final 20 shortlisted, then we’ll ask for a full Picture Book or three chapters to help our judge – but don’t panic if you haven’t quite finished those yet, we’ll give you a week to get it together for us.

What can I win?

Finalists will all receive individual feedback on their entry from our agent judge in addition to their feedback from our team of experienced authors.

The runner-up will receive one year of membership to the WriteMentor Hub, our online membership platform for children’s writers.

The winner will receive six months of WriteMentor mentoring and one year of WriteMentor Hub membership.

Please read the rules below before you enter. Once you’ve paid for your entry, you will receive a link via an email confirmation to upload your entry. Good luck!

Meet the judge: Katie Blagden

Katie Blagden is a Literary Agent based in London. She represents authors and author-illustrators across various genres and age ranges. In children’s she specialises in Middle Grade, YA and Crossover Fiction, and Graphic Novels across all age ranges. 

She is dedicated to championing traditionally under-represented stories and authors. This includes writers from Black, Asian, Mixed Heritage and Minority Ethnic backgrounds; disabled and neurodiverse writers; LGBTQ+ writers; and working class writers. She is actively seeking writers and stories from diverse backgrounds and viewpoints. 

In all these areas I am looking for commercial, plot-driven ideas with a great hook! 

Some books I love: All That’s Left in the World by Erik J Brown; The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness; Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas; Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi; The Deathless Girls by Kiran Millwood Hargrave; Holes by Louis Sachar; Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo; Gone by Michael Grant; His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman; Impossible Creatures by Katherine Rundell; The Dark Lady by Akala; Percy Jackson by Rick Riordan; The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper; Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer.

Rules

• Entries do not need to be complete but you should have a solid idea for the story and have begun work on it.
• Open worldwide but entries must be in English.
• You can also enter, even if your novel/PB text is complete.
• We are accepting only PB/CB/MG/YA entries of any genre.
• You cannot be agented.
• To clarify, self-published novels are eligible. 
• Independently published writers, without an agent, may enter, but not with the published novel (as your publisher holds the rights).
• Entries should comprise of a pitch (no more than 50 words) and a first page (of no more than 250 words or 3 spreads for PBs).
• Enter the first page (250 words or 3 spreads of a PB) and a 50 word pitch (at the start of the document).
• Name your document with your manuscript/idea title. As we use google forms, your name will appear on your confirmation email, but please note we do read blind.
• The form will have a section to indicate genre and age category, so no need to include this in your pitch.
• Any comp titles should be included within the 50 words on your pitch.
• Please do not include illustrator notes or illustrations on your PB entry. We are only judging the text.
• All announcements will happen via the site, so do sign up to receive alerts of new blog posts and to our mailing list, as well as Twitter account.
• Those under the age of 18 are ineligible due to safeguarding reasons. If you are younger than 18 and wish to enter, please ask an adult to do this on your behalf.
• You may enter as many ideas as you wish, but will need to enter and pay for them separately.
• All entries will be sent digitally. We are committed to being green and want to keep costs for writers down, so mail entries will not be allowed.

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