Results of the Splintered Lands Contest

I wanted to thank all of you who voted for my story, “Blessed,” for the Splintered Lands contest. I truly appreciate the time you spent to vote and for the support you have given me in regards to this story.


This contest was a fiasco of epic proportions. Not only was it mishandled, Deepwood Publishing all but admitted through a tweet that “They could change the votes if they had to.” Well, perhaps they did.

What the results boiled down to was three of the four finalists being “disqualified,” leaving the sole author as the default winner. Not how I would have like to win, but a publishing credit is a publishing credit. They claimed that there were too many “voting inconsistencies that led to multiple authors being disqualified.”I did email Deepwood asking why my story was DQ’d, but have heard nothing from them. Unfortunately, I really don’t expect to.

For the record, despite the insinuation, I am not a cheater, nor did I ask anyone to cheat for me. Mostly, I am angry because I spent over six days crafting a story worthy enough for their anthology, only to have them toss it out for reasons beyond my control.

So, when play is not fair, how do you hope to win?

I am left with a story I am immensely proud of. When time allows, I’ll tear it down and build it up in my own world, with my own rules.

Varinia Sulan shall live on!

On My Way to Publication via Your Vote

Howdy all!

I have been slacking off on the princess posts and for that I do apologize, however, I have been busy with other writing projects.
I entered a contest for the Splintered Lands anthology http://splinteredlands.com/. This is a post apocalyptic land where magic has torn the world apart. Magic wielders and technologists are despise and hunted, while the Knights govern what they can and destroy the rest.

My story, "Blessed," is one of the four finalists. It under my pen name of Nicki Delone. Who ever wins, will have his/her story as part of the anthology to be published by Deepwood Publishing.

So if you have some time, go to the website and read the submissions. I have some tough competition. Your vote is greatly appreciated. Tell all your friends, neighbors, and paper boys. I don't know how long the voting will stay open, so hurry, hurry, hurry!

One Beautiful Baby

After two days of blinding Ariel with camera flashes, we finally got "the money shot" for the Beautiful Baby contest on Live! with Regis and Kelly.

In hindsight, I should have planned ahead and took pictures earlier, so you all could have a say and vote (don't worry, I'm sure you'll be doing this later, March 1, wink, wink). Anyway, we'll find out if we made the semi-finals the week of February 22. Should we make finals, we'll be flying out to New York March 1 to be on the show. That's when the public at large will get to vote on the 5 finalists. I'll keep you posted.

Although I'm severely biased, I think Ariel has a good shot. You can visit http://bventertainment.go.com/tv/buenavista/regisandkelly/contests/beautifulbaby10/index.htmlto check out the competition, I mean galleries for the 2010 baby contest. Wish us luck!

Best in Show (sort of)

Today we went to Pet Palace, a locally owned pet store (http://www.petpalaceusa.net/). Every year they have a pet costume contest. Last year Pazu went as a wizard, but he didn't place. This year, since he had such a kick-butt costume, I was hoping he would finish strong. Even if someone recognized him, that would have been a great consolation prize.

Since I'm a screw up, I didn't get my costume finished before the event, even though I tried my hardest to do so. Eric dressed up and this is what made Pazu's costume so great.

Anyway, there were about 30 entrants and some of the costumes looked fantastic. I was starting to get a little worried. There were a lot of butterflies and princesses. Eric was not impressed by these. We were #27 and Eric took Pazu to center stage. Since our dog is full of chicken poo, he didn't do any tricks. He didn't pee on anything either, so I shouldn't complain.

The judges went back into deliberation and here were the results.

Honorable mention to a dog in pj's and king of the hound dogs (yes, he was dressed as Elvis in the white jumpsuit).

4th place - Pazu as a Koopa Troopa! (did they just say our dog's name?)

3rd place - dog dressed as a fighter pilot (complete with goggles)

2nd place - dog dressed as a life guard (this was cute, he had the striped shirt and life preserver)

1st place - dog and owner dressed as reconnaissance field agents (think camouflage and ammo packs)

I am totally floored by our 4th place finish. It's nice to see hard work pay off. We were also awarded a $25 gift card to the store, so we'll be using this for Pazu's Christmas and birthday gifts. Just wanted to share this wonderful and surprising accomplishment.