Novel Novice Contest Policy

We hope you enjoy the many contests we offer here on Novel Novice! A few notes about our contest policy:

1. The prizes for most contests held on Novel Novice are provided by the publisher or author. In some cases, we provide the prizing ourselves. Prizes provided by publishers or authors are done with the intention of promoting their book;  we do not receive payment for hosting these contests.
   .
2. Unless otherwise stated, all contests on Novel Novice are limited to the U.S. only. This stipulation is usually put in place by the publisher or authors we work with. If we are running the contest independently, this limitation is because we simply cannot afford to pay international shipping out of pocket. It’s too expensive. We always invite international contests to enter if they have a friend or family member living in the U.S. who can accept the prize on their behalf. We do sometimes host international giveaways, and do our best to advertise them prominently.
   .
3. We collect your mailing address when you enter one of our contests. This has been standard procedure at Novel Novice from almost day one. The reason we do this is to streamline the process of choosing winners, and it helps eliminate contestants from entering with invalid mailing addresses. (It was just taking too long to choose a winner, email them, wait for a response, etc. And half the time, the winner would email back with an international address on a U.S.-only contest. This was not a viable option for me to continue running contests.) We do NOT share your mailing address or use it for any other purposes. The mailing address is ONLY used to mail out your prize if you are chosen as the winner.
   .
4. We do ask for a street address in lieu of a PO Box because most prizes are shipped using UPS or similar carriers, which cannot deliver to PO Boxes.
   .
5. We do not routinely email the winners of our contests. Winners are announced on the blog — usually once a month, for the previous month’s contests (although sometimes I DO fall behind). Unless we are hosting the contest ourselves, prizes are sent out by the publisher or author providing them in whatever time frame suits them. (And if I am sending the prizes out … I am very slow. I’m sorry; I just can’t get to the post office that often, and remember I have to pay for postage out of pocket!)
   .
6. Novel Novice cannot be held responsible for any prizes lost in the mail or delivered to the wrong address. We send prizes to the address provided to us by the contestant during the entry process, so please always make sure this information is accurate and complete when you fill out the entry forms.
   .
7. In the event of too few entries, we reserve the right to declare no winner for any given contest.
   .
8. Contests on Novel Novice are intended for the enjoyment of blog followers & book lovers. We reserve the right to disqualify anyone from one of our contests for whatever reason we see fit. Contests are run for promotional purposes, and are meant to be fun. We will not tolerate cheating or abuse of the contest/entry system.