It’s a contest! Follow me on Twitter and win!

Follow me on Twitter and win! (Button not included.)

That’s right, I’m doing a contest. As part of my NaNoWriMo participation, anyone who’s following me on Twitter by midnight (EST) on Nov. 30, 2011, has a chance to WIN. And it’s not Charlie Sheen-style winning either, which would indicate a mere gloss of confidence thinly masking immense personal loss and self-destruction. There are tangible prizes!

 On Dec. 1 or shortly thereafter, I’m going to randomly* choose the winner, who will have the option of one of these fabulous prizes:

• A critique of the winner’s NaNoWriMo efforts. I might be relatively new to the novel game, but I’ve been a professional writer all my life and I have a couple non-fiction books to my credit. Ergo, the critique isn’t just some guy spouting off. Plus, I’ll be nice about it. If you didn’t write something during NaNoWriMo, you can have me critique something else up to the length of a standard novel. (Accepting this prize doesn’t guarantee you squat in terms of getting your work published; it’s merely my opinion as a guy who gets paid to write stuff.
• A sneak peek at my book Spacebuckler, currently out on submission. Yes, you will be one of a handful of people who have EVER read this work. Check out the About the Book link for more. Choose this, and you’ll already be conversant about this book when it gets published, earning instant geek cred as an early adopter. (Accepting this prize means you’re promising not to steal it, copy it, disseminate it, rip it off in your own work or otherwise mess with my rights to it. Just saying.)

And I promise, even if you don’t win, it’s totally worth it to follow me on Twitter. Tweets can include the following:

• Pop culture geek stuff;
• Recommendations of different beers to try;
• Interesting articles on history, space science and, yes, beer;
• Tips on writing and/or procrastination;
• Updates on my NaNoWriMo efforts during November; AND
• Updates on Spacebuckler and its in-process sequel.

Seriously, I just KNOW I’m going to make a fine addition to your Twitter feed. Plus, you could WIN. So follow me on Twitter between now and the end of November to win. If you’re already a follower, well, you have my gratitude, and you’re already in. But if any follower, new or veteran, retweets this contest to their followers, well…I can’t promise anything other than great karma, but karma is good, right? I mean, I follow the Dalai Lama, and he says it is.

*Note: Twitter followers with whom I have a pre-existing personal or working relationship don’t qualify. Sorry, guys. I’ll buy you coffee or something.