FAQ for Authors

Canadian fiction authors. Indie, hybrid, tradpub—all are welcome! The more people we get, across the entire CanLit spectrum, the more interest we are likely to generate.

English-language fiction of all kinds, except erotica. I want picture books. I want early readers. I want graphic novels. I want hard-hitting difficult things that make people think. I want light, fluffy romcoms and wild genre-crossers. I want short stories and novellas and novels. I want SF and fantasy and mystery and horror and comedies and all the fiction. And I want it to come from authors in every single province and territory if that is at all possible. If you do humorous zombie space operas, you can participate. If you do steampunk western mysteries, you can participate. If it’s fiction, you can participate.

What counts as erotica for the purposes of this event? If the main point of a particular book is the sex scenes, this is not the right showcase for that book. If, however, a particular book has sex scenes that further the plot or character development, that’s fine. This rule is in place in order to ensure we aren’t losing marketing opportunities for the event as a whole because our partners may not be permitted to work with events promoting certain genres. Additionally, all authors need to declare a “spice level” for each submitted book so that readers can filter the showcase according to their own preferences.

We are accepting graphic novels and picture books.

If you are credited on a book’s cover as the illustrator, and you are a Canadian living in Canada, then you are welcome to participate in Fiction Fest with that book, even if the text was written by a non-Canadian. All other information in these FAQs and “the rules” also apply to illustrators.

(For books written and illustrated by different Canadians, we suggest maybe speaking to your creative partners before sending in your info so you don’t both end up using the same books.)

No. Because tradpub authors don’t generally have any control over the prices of their books, I want to set this up as a true showcase event rather than a sale. If you have the ability to reduce your pricing for the promo period, you are certainly welcome to, but you do not have to. Each book will have a showcase card with up to 4 links to outside sales platforms, but no pricing will be shown on that card. You can take a look at the screenshot from the test data showcase page under “What the heck is Fiction Fest?” above.

Print, e-book, and audiobooks are accepted. Uploaded images must be a flat rectangle, however, so if you have an audiobook, paste it into a rectangle first or use the associated print or ebook cover when you upload. In the submission form, you can indicate whether your book is available in each of these media types, and there will be icons on each book card in the showcase to let readers know what formats are available for any given book. They will also be able to filter the showcase to show just the format types they are interested in.

Because we’re a big country and not everyone has the means to pay for travel, hotel, and ticket prices for standard conventions. Because trying to do this in-person would be shockingly cost-prohibitive and nightmarish to organize. And, most importantly, because so many people have been shut out of being able to participate in this kind of thing before because of health reasons. I wanted to do something that everyone can access, from anywhere in the country with Internet access, no matter what their health, mobility, or financial limitations are.

1. Each author may submit up to two (2) books for Fiction Fest.
2. Submitting a book to the event gets you a listing for that book on the Showcase page, with up to four (4) links out to your choice of sales platforms.
3. You also get a listing on the Authors page with your head shot, bio, and up to three (3) outbound links that you can use for your author site, newsletter sign up page, and social media.
4. We are hoping to organize live virtual sessions featuring panel discussions and author readings for those interested in doing those.
   Note 1: Participation in these sessions, if we can get them set up, is unpaid. Apologies. I’d love to pay you, but I’ve already put my own money into buying the domain name and paying for the site hosting and other technical requirements, and I have already poured many (so many) days of labour into organizing and building out the infrastructure for this event. I’m also going to be the one turning all the sign up form responses into actual web things. I’m not getting paid for any of this and sadly, I do not have the funds to pay anyone else, either.
   Note 2: Participation in the live sessions is completely voluntary; you are not required to participate in any sessions in order to have your books in the showcase.
5. This is NOT a bundle promo. As such, I cannot guarantee that any book will sell copies or that your sales will increase during the event. That will depend on how much interest we can collectively drum up, and whether individual readers are interested in your particular book(s).

When you submit the sign up form to become a Fiction Fest author, your images, book blurbs, bio, and links will be used to create the showcase and gallery pages where readers will be able to see your books and find more information about you.

Your email will be used for organizing in the lead up to the event, to get you scheduled into any live virtual sessions you may wish to participate in, and to contact you if we need to during the event itself.

After the event, all your information will be deleted unless you have specifically requested that I keep your email address in my author notifications email list. If you make that request, your email will be retained and will only be used to notify you when submissions open for the next Fiction Fest.

There is no cost for authors to join this event.

I will provide images and ALT text that you can use to help promote the event on your social media sites and in your newsletters, and which you can also provide to any media or politicians that request them.

I will be contacting city councillors and media in the city of Ottawa to ask if they will share/cover the event. As stated in The Rules (the next FAQ section below), participating authors are expected to contact their own city councillor, in whatever ward for the city they are in and do the same. The thinking here is that if we ALL do a little bit to help promote the event, we’ll be able to get a lot more eyes on this thing! I will provide an email template to help you reach out for this purpose.

1. *** NO AI ALLOWED *** Absolutely no AI is permitted in this event. As in, you can’t have used it in your writing, your cover, or any of your interior art. At all. (Yes, standard spell-checkers are fine. No, chatGPT, Midjourney, Copilot, Gemini or any other such generative AI systems are not. Not even ones you “trained” yourself.)
2. All participating authors MUST be Canadian and living in Canada.
3. Submitted books must be in English (translations are welcome!)
4. No erotica.
5. Purchasing links (except for Itchi.io links, if applicable) must go to platforms listing prices in $CAD.
6. All participating authors must agree to share the event at least once in their author newsletter (if you have one) and on their social media accounts during the event. All participating authors ALSO agree to reach out to their local city councillor and at least one local media organization (small to mid-size newspapers or community TV stations, for example) prior to the event to request link shares and/or media coverage during the event.
   
   NOTE: All participating authors will be provided with images (plus associated ALT text) and email templates to use (if desired… feel free to create your own if you’d prefer) when contacting councillors and media. I get this part is really daunting and that most of us dread any kind of marketing or even being in the spotlight at all. But the thinking here is that if we all do a little bit, all across the country, we can hopefully create a groundswell of public interest in this event, in our showcase books, and in CanLit in general. It’s a way for all of us to work together in solidarity as Canadian authors, in an industry that seems to get harder to succeed in by the day. It’s us having each other’s backs, shouting out all our books, shining a light on the incredible amount of literary talent we have in this country, and hopefully having fun with it all while we do. 😊