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Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Third Bear Carnival: a Bull Spec contest with 3 identical prizes. First, the meta contest.

I'm quite late to the festival which is/was Matthew Cheney's Third Bear Carnival. But to make up for this tardiness, I have 3 copies of Jeff VanderMeer's recent collection The Third Bear which need a good home:

   

Actually, I have 4 copies. But the first 3 copies are for a contest to be determined by a preliminary (meta?) contest, which itself awards the 4th copy as its prize.

Confused? You have barely scratched the surface of bizarre, in any number of ways.

So, contest the first: in a comment on this blog post, design for me a contest which gives away the other 3 copies. You have a little less than one week. At or around noon (Eastern US Time) next Monday (20 September), I will pick the winner and start said contest, to be open for one week. The winner of the first contest gains immortal fame, etc. and also one copy of The Third Bear for themselves. The winner(s) of the second contest gain, of course, immortal fame, etc. and also one copy of The Third Bear as well.

Eligibility: anyone may submit one contest idea and even win, but books are eligible to be sent only where USPS media mail travels. Be creative. Be ... creative.

6 comments:

  1. I suggest a contest writing about your favorite of Jeff's books, as author or editor, and why you like it.

    My other idea would by why is SF important to you and how did you become a fan?

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  3. I suggest a contest in which each competitor must submit a piece of flash fiction (under 1000 words) inspired by The Third Bear (however broadly).
    - Stephen Gordon (ironnoir@gmail.com)

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  4. I already have a copy (and, as poetry editor, am probably disqualified), but: A contest in which competitors submit a book review for an SF book which has not (ever) been written. (For those baffled by this idea, I am thinking of Jorge Luis Borges' penchant for writing reviews of non-existent books.)

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  5. I have to admit, Dan, that your idea is an early front runner. Though Stephen's, modified to a be shorter flash piece so that I can actually read them, is tempting as well.

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  6. I'm going to go with a mix of Dan's and Stephen's idea, and send the book to Stephen. I don't have time for a full post today, but it will be something like "Submit a book title and blurb-length review, written by and attributed to whomever you like whether fictional or real, for a SF book which has not (ever) been written, max 100 or so words total".

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