The Tracking Board Is Pleased to Announce the Launch Pad Manuscript Winners of the Inkshares Publishing Prize
0The Tracking Board and its partners Scott Free Productions, Energy Entertainment, and Inkshares are proud to announce the winners of the Inkshares Publishing Prize for our inaugural Launch Pad Manuscript Competition. These incredible manuscripts were voted upon by the Inkshares community and received the highest number of unique reader pre-orders. These three winners will be published by Inkshares as part of the Launch Pad Collection and will receive editorial, design, print, and marketing services for their winning manuscript. Best of all, each of the three winners will receive distribution to booksellers like Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Nobles, and hundreds of independent bookstores for both physical and digital bookshelves around the world.
In its first year, the Launch Pad Manuscript Competition has already seen a number of writers sign with top agents and managers and saw Ridley Scott’s Scot Free Productions acquire not one but two manuscripts from this year’s competition to develop for the big screen.
Winners
World War Z meets The Strain.
After a zombie apocalypse, corporations run by vampires create heavily guarded city-states to preserve the human race – as a subjugated food supply.
PLACEMENT IN COMPETITION: Winner of the Scott Free Guaranteed Option Prize and Top 25 in LPMC
Batten is a writer of science-fiction and fantasy residing in Australia’s rugged island state of Tasmania. As an information management consultant with experienced knowledge, he has traveled extensively and worked in diverse roles — from the tranquility of the deep wilderness to the urgency of the corporate jungle. He uses his broad experience to craft new worlds, breathing life to their histories and chronicling them for his readers.
Deadwood meets The Revenant.
A farmer takes his recently deceased son across the country in order to bury him next to his wife. He must deal with the worst of humanity and nature as he makes the arduous journey while being mistaken for a dangerous criminal, but things only get worse when he arrives at his son’s final resting place to discover that his wife is alive and well.
PLACEMENT IN COMPETITION: Top 10 in LPMC
Pletts has lived many lives – line cook, musician, communications director of a telecom startup, but through them all, one passion has remained constant: his love of storytelling. When his first feature script I Killed Buddy Cloy landed on The Black List (2008) he and his writing partner signed with WMA. After co-directing and co-writing an award-winning short Bridge (2009), he and his partner developed a feature project with Mandeville Films’ David Hoberman and director Jeffrey Nachmanoff (Traitor, Homeland). In 2013, while working in the production department on films such as Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks, he embarked on a solo writing career. His first television spec was selected for the 2nd round of Sundance’s 2016 Episodic TV lab and was the #1 script on The Black List website for the month of August. Currently, he’s assisting writer/director/producer Kari Skogland (The Walking Dead, House of Cards) with her upcoming slate of television projects and working on his debut novel.
Not That Kind of Girl meets Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.
Based on her real-life experiences, an award-winning soap opera writer details her life as a “real-size” girl breaking into the entertainment industry, telling stories of love, sex, family secrets, illness, and more.
PLACEMENT IN COMPETITION: Honorable mention.
Nipkow’s feature screenplay, Salt of the Earth, the true story of three blacklisted Commie filmmakers who, against all odds, go to the desert to make the first independent film, was selected for development at the 2016 Stowe Story Labs. She is currently writing a short, Carwash Donuts, about life(ish) inside the cancer machine, and finishing her memoir-in-essays, How to Kiss Like a Movie Star. Her work has appeared in O: the Oprah Magazine, the New York Times, Written By, Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood, FreshYarn.com, the New York Post, and the NYU Press anthology, More New York Stories, the Best of the New York Times City Section.
Also receiving the publishing from Inkshares will be the three Grand Prize Winners of the Launch Pad Manuscript Competition as voted on by our esteemed judging panel of industry professionals.
They are FILICIDE by Danny Newell, who also won the guaranteed signing prize from Energy Entertainment and Brooklyn Weaver; KING’S DAUGHTER by Julia Bobkoff; and MR. & MRS. AMERICAN PIE by Juliet McDaniel.
To learn more about the Launch Pad Competition, which is currently accepting submissions for the Pilot Competition, please click here.
Congratulations to the winners of the Inkshares Publishing Prize for the Launch Pad’s inaugural Manuscript Competition!