Victoria Strauss -- Sobol Contest Closes

Thanks to an anonymous comment in my previous post for the information that the Sobol Contest has closed According to the Sobol website, all entries will be destroyed, and entrants will get their money back.

I'm sure that many theories will be offered for the contest's failure: the entry fees were too high, the contest's ill-advised presentation and publicity made it look suspicious, writers didn't want to potentially tie themselves to a currently nonexistent literary agency. But I don't think there's any doubt that a major part of what scuttled Sobol was the unprecedented storm of criticism and negative publicity that swept the blogosphere after the award was announced.

I was part of the storm. I thought, and still think, that my criticism was justified, but in light of this new development, I have very mixed feelings.

Food for thought.