Now is your chance to find out!

Dark Idol is an elimination contest where ONE winner will walk away with the grand prize - an EDITOR to provide them with a personal critique and full edit of one manuscript of their choosing.

Black Light Horror Productions (www.blacklighthorror.ca) and The Barnard Agency (www.barnardagency.ca) bring back a revolutionary concept to the world of horror writing where the readers decide who has what it takes to be the next big name in the field of horror by voting on their favourites, then eliminating the writer with the least votes until one stands triumphant as Dark Idol 2009-2010.

Entrants can submit their original work of 500 words or less on a theme of their choice. All entries must be submitted to darkidolcontest@gmail.com before 12:00 a.m. EST Friday october 23rd, 2009. Our panel of judges will appraise each submission, and narrow them down to a final eight contestants. The finalists will be announced here on october 31st, 2009. The elimination rounds begin at that time, and will run until all but one writer is eliminated.

The final eight will be given a theme and word count assignment to complete and send in for critique by our panel. The work as well as judges' comments will be posted at the site each cycle, along with a poll inviting the readers to be the final judges of who gets to move on to the next round. The voting for each round will be live for two weeks once the assignments are posted, then closed. An email will be sent to all the finalists announcing who is moving forward and who has been removed from the contest. At that time the next assignment will be handed out along with the guidelines and the process will begin again-continuing to be chosen through elimination until only one contestant remains as the winner. Although the polls are open for two weeks, the writers must hand in their assignments one week after receiving them to provide all judges enough time to evaluate each entry before announcing the new poll. This means that although 8 contestants are writing an assigment piece, only the 7 chosen to move forward will have their pieces appear online for voting.

The winner of Dark Idol 2009-2010 will receive a personal critique and full edit of one manuscript of their choosing from Wendy Barnard of The Barnard Agency. They may also take advantage of a basic website design from Gwenyth Love of Black Light Horror Productions. More prizes may be forthcoming and will be announced after they have been confirmed in writing.

The Fine Print:

This contest is open to writers 18 years of age or older at the time of their submission, or of legal age in their area of residence to allow them to enter into a contract. Residency in Canada, where this contest is based is not required, but the contest is void where prohibited by local law.

This contest is open to those who are not professional writers in any field, nor have had a novel or collection of short stories published by any publishing house under their own name or a pen name. However, if you have had work printed in an anthology which was edited and or published by someone other than yourself, that's fine. In other words, if you make a living writing in any capacity, or if you have released a bound, published work as a sole or joint author or editor, you are NOT eligible to enter. We want to find fresh, new talent.

Decision of the judges as well as the vote itself is final and no correspondence will be entered into regarding the result.

While you retain all copyrights to your work, by submitting you grant BLACK LIGHT HORROR PRODUCTIONS permission to post your work on the website-be it in excerpted or full form.

The comments on each submitted work may be harsh - by entering this competition you agree to not hold either the judges or BLACK LIGHT HORROR PRODUCTIONS liable for any unflattering comments made regarding the work you submit. Be prepared - this will be a tough competition.

Submissions are to be ATTACHED to the body of an e-mail in RTF FORMAT - NO EXCEPTIONS WILL BE MADE - NO REMINDERS OR PROMPTS WILL BE GIVEN TO ANY AUTHOR WHO SUBMITS THEIR ENTRY INCORRECTLY. YOUR SUBMISSION WILL BE DELETED, REGARDLESS OF YOUR STANDING OR POSITION IN THE COMPETITION IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THIS SIMPLE GUIDELINE.

Although the value of the prizes might be priceless, the actual cash value of the award is zero, and is not redeemable for a cash equivalent.

It will take a majority vote from the judges for a contestant to advance to the final eight. All work submitted to the judges will be submitted without author names attached so that the work can be judged on its own merit.

Your work will NOT be edited before being forwarded to the judges and being published on the website, so Grammar and Spelling counts. Italicized words should be italicized.

If you still require any further clarification on the rules please send an email to darkidolcontest@gmail.com.

Link to Dark Idol!

Please right click and "save as" to your own computer and link the image back to -

http://blacklighthorror.ca/darkidol/

Web & graphic design provided by:
Chris Mushing