Mary Keating, Winner – Pitch Week XXVIII

Mary Keating became a paraplegic at age 15 in a car accident. Fifty years later, she’s married to her soulmate, is an advanced scuba diver, a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, a Yale Law School graduate, a disability advocate and the founder of her own law practice. Mary won Pitch Week XXVIII for Recalibrating Gravity, a memoir in verse that explores our messy, but precious and fragile, existence with humor and love. She is the first poet to win gold.

With a pocketbook full of poetry, Mary shaped her poems into her life’s story. With the help of When Words Count’s coaches, judges, editor and cover designer, Mary is now ready to bring her words of hope, faith and love to all of us to help us live our best lives no matter our circumstances.

Pitch Week pushes its contestants to excel while developing lifetime bonds and gaining access to a wealth of knowledge from people in the publishing arena. During the contest, not only did Mary get her manuscript ready for publication, she learned how to best package it with a striking cover and alluring cover copy. She developed a marketing plan, learned how to secure book blurbs, and how to present herself as an author.

“Pitch Week is an intensive seminar with the benefit of working with other fledgling authors, all collaborating to help each other secure a traditional publishing contract. The contest is a bit like  a marathon, but it is well worth the results.”

See our other Pitch Week XXVIII finalists here.