Tag Archives: Writing Competition

Stroud Short Stories is Open for Submissions until 8 March 2020

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Stroud Short Stories is currently open for submissions for its special 20th event which is dedicated to Stroud writer Rick Vick who sadly died at the end of November. There were obituaries for Rick in The Times and The Guardian. Here is the latter.
 
The event is for all Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire writers. The theme this time is DISRUPTION. Submissions are free and you may submit unpublished or published stories. Ten stories will be selected and their authors will read/perform them at our event.
The deadline is the end of Sunday 8 March and the event is on Sunday 19 April at the 150-seater Cotswold Playhouse. Tickets will go on sale on 20 March.
 
All information about submitting is on the Stroud Short Stories website.

Call for submissions – Let your creativity sparkle!

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Call for submissions – 2019 Ouen Press Short Story Competition

Ouen Press are pleased to extend an invitation for writers to submit an original short story in line with this year’s theme – ‘The Gift’. Winning authors will receive cash prizes and be published in an anthology early in the New Year. This follows on from the success of the competition in previous years and subsequent publications .

Ouen Press 2019 Short Story Competition – The Gift – Call for Submissions!

The short story must be a work of fiction involving in its theme a ‘gift’ of any sort [e.g. a present, a capability ] at any time [past, present day, future] or in any place [this world or another]. For the purposes of this competition, the term ‘gift’ will be viewed by the judges in the widest possible sense related to both setting and context. They will focus on well-written compelling storylines, thoughtful plots and engaging characters.

Deadline for entries is 31st December 2019 – full information and rules of the competition, which is open to writers worldwide, can be found at www.ouenpress.com

 For updates on our activities – come follow us on Twitter @OuenP 

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Quarterly Short Story Competition from Cranked Anvil

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We are delighted to announce our quarterly short story competition.

The competition is open to any theme or genre, but your story must be a maximum of 1,500 words (not including the title). Closing dates are:

30th April
31st July
31st October
31st January

You can enter up to three stories in each quarterly competition.
Entry fees: £5 for the first | plus £3 for the second | plus £2 for the third

Prizes
1st – £150
2nd – £75
3rd – £30

The three placed stories from each quarter will be published on this website. Future anthologies will also be considered, published by Cranked Anvil Press, in which shortlisted stories from each competition will be published.

Full details of the competition, how to enter, and competition rules, can be found on our website.

Good luck!

Leicester Writes Short Story Prize 2019

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We’re delighted to announce the Leicester Writes Short Story Prize 2019 is now open for entries.

We’re looking for new and original fiction under 3000 words.

Stories can be any length (up to 3000 words) style, or subject. There is no set theme.

£7 per story. Max three entries per person.

Writers submitting from within Leicestershire can submit for a discounted fee of £3. Free entry for current students at De Montfort University, Loughborough University and University of Leicester.

PRIZES

1st Prize   – £100 and a bundle of books

2nd Prize – £50 and a bundle of books

3rd Prize – A bundle of books

A longlist of a maximum of 20 stories will be published in an anthology. A shortlist will be selected by our esteemed judging panel, including writers Rebecca Burns, Jonathan Taylor and Susmita Bhattacharya.

Deadline:  15th April 2019

For more details on how to enter and our prize terms please visit our website.

Story Friday Invitation – Call For Submissions

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Best invitation ever?  Worst??

Story Friday  in March has the theme Invitation… to the ball, to the party, to the pub, to the moon, to the wedding, to heaven, to hell?  What is more intriguing than the perfect – or imperfect – invitation? We are inviting writers to write their favourite invitation story for a glorious story-party in March.

Story Friday Invitation will be on 22nd March, deadline for submissions is 11th March. We’re looking for stories that are 2,000 words or fewer.  (Full submission details are here).  Writers must be available to come to Bath for the event.  If you’d rather not read, we have wonderful actors who can read your story for you.

For more information about Story Friday, to listen to stories that we have recorded at our events over the years, and/or to submit your story please visit A Word In Your Ear.

Go Gothic – Short Story and Flash Fiction Competitions

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The Still Tower of Tavistock Abbey.

A Gothic Short Story Writing Competition
Hosted by Tavistock Library https://www.facebook.com/TavistockLibrary/ and supported by Tavistock Heritage Trust https://www.heritageintavistock.org/ as part of ‘Tavistock’s 1st Gothic and Neo-Gothic Celebration – Literature, Art, Architecture, Theatre, Film and Creative Fun.’

From Saturday the 12th of October and culminating in a market and author event on Saturday the 19th of October 2019.

This new celebration aims to encompass writing, film, drama and art activities.  There will be a Gothic market for writers and traders to showcase their work, and a range of related events.

Theme: A short story in the Gothic tradition incorporating folklore and myth.

Prizes: A cash prize will be offered to the overall winner 30% of all entry receipts will form the prize fund. There will also be a second prize of 30% of all the entry fees awarded to a ‘Gothic’ story based in Tavistock and incorporating its Gothic and Neo-Gothic Heritage. Additional runners-up prizes of books will also be awarded. The prize winners will be notified approximately two weeks prior to the prize giving. The remaining 40% of the entry fees will be used for administration costs and for festival and library events.

 

Presentation of the Prizes: The results will be announced, and the prizes presented at an event to be during the celebration.

Judging: The judging will be in two stages. The final short list of stories will be judged by a panel of librarians, authors and publishers. Shortlisted entries will be ranked by a final judging panel.

Tips: The judges will be looking for interesting and original stories that are factually correct where appropriate.

Publication: Depending on the number and quality of the entries received an e-anthology may be published.

A Gothic Short Story Writing Competition
For anyone over the age of 18

Rules and Conditions of Entry

  1. Entries must be in English, original and not previously published in any form or broadcast, and no longer than 1500 words (adult).
  2. Closing date: May 31st
  3. Results: Available to the public from the 12th of October 2019.
  4. Entries must be typewritten or word-processed on single-sided A4 paper, in 12-point typeface, double (or 1.5 times) spaced. Each page must carry the name of the story in the header or footer and pages must be numbered. Do not put your name on the story pages. Please attach a cover sheet with your name, address, telephone and if possible your e-mail contact details, title of your story, and word count. Entries may be emailed to wilkins@librariesunlimited.org.uk and a copy to myfanwyc@btinternet.com
  5. Entries may be delivered by hand or by post to Go Gothic – Flash Fiction Competition to Tavistock Library, The Quay, Plymouth Road, Tavistock, Devon, PL19 8HF, England. Please include your payment by cheque (in sterling) made payable to The Friends of Tavistock Library or BACS Transfer: Account name: Friends of Tavistock Library, Account number: 32152922, Sort code: 602149. Payment may also be made in cash at Tavistock Library.
  6. Entry fees: Adults – £3 for first entry, £2 for second or subsequent entry. If you intend to submit multiple entries, please submit all entries together.
  7. No manuscripts will be retained so contestants must keep a copy of their work.
  8. Copyright remains with the author.
  9. If acknowledgement of receipt is required, please include a stamped and addressed postcard.
  10. The judges’ decision is final, and no correspondence will be entered into.
  11. In accordance with the 2018 European Union General Data Protection Regulation Act (EU GDPR) your information will not be kept on a data base or used for marketing purposes and we will only contact you to tell you if you have won the competition and when all the logos will be on display.
  12. Entry to the competition implies acceptance of the rules.

Twitter: 

https://twitter.com/MyfanwyCook 

https://twitter.com/tavilibrary?lang=en

A doorway that was once and entrance into Tavistock Abbey.

 

© 2018 Myfanwy Cook.

From LGBTQ+ With Love: The Fight Back Flash Competition

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Dearest compatriots, collaborators, friends, foes, gentlepeople, unicorns (both sparkly and plain), folkingtons, allies and everyone in between and either side and up and down and diagonal and round and round the whole glorious spectrum of humanity.

You may have heard about a rather unpleasant exclusionary flash fiction competition that’s been doing the rounds on Twitter lately. Not just exclusionary, but implying members of the LGBTQ+ community are somehow comparable to scenes of graphic violence or torture. Yeah. Not exactly what we want to see from a writing competition in 2018.

But you cannot fight hate with hate. The answer is love. Only love and always love. Whatever damn kind of love you’re into. Because love knows no bounds, people.

And so. Writers’ HQ are running a flash fiction competition on the theme: From LGBTQ+ With Love, with all proceeds going to MindOut, a mental health service for LGBTQ+ people.

Specifically, we want your LGBTQ+ stories, your stories of love, grace and compassion (and most importantly your creative swearing). Here’s the lowdown in a handy bullet list – click here for the full rules, FAQs and entry form:

SUBMIT YOUR STORIES HERE!

LGBTQ+ flash competition

Story Friday Feast – call for submissions!

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As we hurtle towards Christmas we’re planning our next Story Friday and the theme is Feast!  We’re looking for stories long and short that touch on feasting. You might go traditional and give us tables laden with roast meats and suet puddings, or take us to far-flung corners of the globe for fresh mangoes and newly dropped coconuts. You might decide that lack-of-feast, or famine, is your interest, or look at a feast that has nothing to do with food. However you want to interpret the theme we know we will be intrigued by your offerings!

Story Friday Feast will be on November 30th, deadline for submissions is on 19th November.  Please check that you are available to come along to Burdall’s Yard in Bath on the 30th November before you submit.

We are looking for short stories or monologues, fact or fiction (but mainly fiction), maximum 2,000 words. If you want to enter a flash piece that can work too, either for the stage, or in print – recently we’ve included a flash piece in our programme for the audience to read in the interval and take home with them. No poetry, thank you.

We have some wonderful professional actors who are very happy to read your story if performance gives you the jitters. Olly Langdon of Kilter Theatre (who is also our brilliant host) will read a male voice, and we have a number of female actors who can read stories which need a female voice.  Let us know in your email when you submit if you’d like someone else to read your piece.

To submit, click here.

12 Writing Tips To Get You Started

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As Anne Frank poignantly wrote: “I can shake off everything as I write; my sorrows disappear, my courage is reborn.” Writing can be an incredible outlet, but sometimes there are stumbling blocks along the way.

Which is why the team at READ Foundation has put together a list of 12 Writing Tips to Get You Started.

Children writing in a classroom

READ is an education charity which builds schools and enables children from poverty-stricken backgrounds to access schooling. We’re currently running a writing competition for short stories, poems and personal essays which will inspire children in their educational path. Scroll down for more details on how to enter.

The charity has gathered the best tips from well-known writers, blogs and the wider web to help writers in their pursuit of the perfect prose.

  1. Write from the heart. A book without a pulse is like a person without a spirit. – Linda F Rad
  2. We love the tips in this Guardian article on the Top 10 Writers’ Tips on Writing. Particularly this one from Katherine Mansfield: “Looking back I imagine I was always writing. Twaddle it was too. But better far write twaddle or anything, anything, than nothing at all.”
  3. Enter competitions, send off examples to agents, read up on literacy festivals to attend, join writing clubs either locally or online – research as many places as you can which can help you on your writing journey, whether the aim is to get published, receive feedback, or simply learn more about the writing process from the people who do it professionally.
  4. Write on a computer which is disconnected from the internet (after you’ve finished reading this blog, obviously). It’s a distraction you can do without.
  5. The “show don’t tell” mentality is well-known for a good reason: it’s true. As fiction author Anton Chekhov puts it: “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”
  6. Oxford Dictionaries has some excellent general advice on better writing, whether it’s a letter, speech, email or something more creative. We like the tip “guide readers through what you write”. The advice is to “help readers understand your message quickly and precisely. To do this, it is necessary to show them clearly how the different parts relate to each other.”
  7. How about a writing tip from a Nobel winning author? Alice Munro, who was given the Nobel for Literature in 2013, has spent most of her writing life focussing on short stories. She said: “Usually I have a lot of acquaintance with the story before I start writing it….stories would just be working in my head for so long that when I started to write I was deep into them.”
  8. Proofread proofread proofread. It’s relly obviously when a sentennce has speling errors in it. If you’re entering a writing competition, judges may penalise you for the errors and it could mean the difference between winning or losing a contest.
  9. Write, even when you don’t feel like it. Get into the habit of writing on a regular basis. If you can commit to writing for a certain amount of time each day, for 30 days, it’ll soon become second nature. About 30-40 days is all you need to make a new habit stick.
  10. Recognise it’s not just your characters that are human – you are too! So if you have periods of struggle, you’re not alone. Don’t be too hard on yourself.
  11. Don’t wait for the perfect moment. Julie Duffy, founder of Story a Day, says “Don’t wait to write until you’re older/wiser/invited to the party. Don’t wait until you have something ‘important’ to say.” Other experts have revealed their best writing tips for beginners.
  12. Enjoy the process! It’s a journey you’ll be proud you’ve taken. Good luck!

While you’re here, we have some exciting news for you. Education charity READ Foundation is running its very first writing competition and needs people like YOU to take part. Read all about it here. The deadline for entries is Wednesday, 10thOctober 2018.

OUEN PRESS SHORT STORY COMPETITION 2017 – FINAL RESULTS JUST OUT!

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Tasting Notes & other short stories – a diverse menu of short fiction expertly crafted to tantalise and entertain.

The very best 2017 competition entries have been published in one anthology entitled ‘Tasting Notes & other short stories’ – a diverse and complex menu of short fiction, expertly crafted to tantalise and entertain.

Contributors were encouraged to explore imaginative interpretations of one or more of the various meanings that could be derived from the term ‘Taste’.

Congratulations to the prizewinners and many thanks to all who entered the competition – visit www.ouenpress.com to view the FINAL RESULTS.

Sussex based editor and writer, Philippa R Francis writing as K.M. Lockwood was placed as overall winner her work ‘Tasting Notes’. Other prizewinners include Texan-based writer Randall G. Arnold for ‘Taste of the Broken Sea, and UEA Creative Writing graduate and editor Krishan Coupland for ‘The Life of Dogbreath’.

Delighted again with the global reach of the competition, we have been enthralled by those who have opted for the less obvious approaches to the brief, as we hoped they would do what excellent writers can do – expand the subject beyond what might first come to mind.

Deadline dates and details of the theme for the next competition will be made available on our website later in the year – or you may wish to check in with us on Twitter @OuenP or Facebook @ouenpress, for more regular updates on future competitions and all our other activities.

Wishing you every success with your future writing projects.

The Ouen Press team

 

Writing Competition: Short Story, Flash Fiction, Poetry

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Just over a week to go now for this great competition for a great cause. So get finalising those poems, flash fictions and short stories. Closing date is next Friday 20th July at 17.00hrs.

Just over 3 weeks to go on this one so get the biros, pencils and laptops working. Closes 5 pm on 20th July

Writing Competition in aid of the Michael Mullan Cancer Fund.

Michael Mullan (26) is battling cancer for third time and needs funds to continue availing of life saving treatment in Boston that is not available in Ireland.

How to Enter

  • Email your short story, flash fiction or poetry entry to: mmcancerfundwritingcompetition@gmail.com.

  • Pay: PayPal.Me/mmcancerfund or by clicking here. Donations in excess of the stipulated entry fee would be most welcome for this deserving cause.

  • Competition is open in Ireland and internationally.

  • Longlist of top 20 authors will be published on www.michaelmullancancerfund.com in mid-August 2018.

  • Shortlist of top 6 authors will be published in early September.

  • Winners will be announced and prizes will be awarded at Kildare Readers Festival on 3rd October 2018.

  • Please read the Terms & Conditions before entering: Terms & Conditions

To the Moon and Back

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The A3 Review is looking for entries to their May contest. This month, they’re inviting stories, poems and artwork on the theme of The Moon. Mystery, cheesy, bloody, science-fictiony, or with cows jumping over it… they welcome all moon-inpired stories.

Stories about werewolves, high tide and low tide, moonlit sonatas, stories based on myths and folklore. Stories about dancing to the light of the moon. What happens to you on nights when the moon is full? Write about that!

For more lunar inspiration, and to enter The A3 Review‘s May contest, check out our Submittable page.

As always, the word limit is 150 words, and all artwork needs to fit into an A6 panel.

Mooning anecdotes most welcome!

Visit them at TheA3Review.com.

 

V. S. Pritchett Short Story Prize 2018

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The Royal Society of Literature is delighted to announce the nineteenth V.S. Pritchett Short Story Prize. There is a prize of £1,000, and the winning entry will be published in Prospect magazine online and in the RSL Review.

Entrants must be resident in the UK, Republic of Ireland or Commonwealth and likely to be available for a prizegiving event in Autumn 2018. Stories entered for the competition must not have been published previously, or broadcast in any other medium.

The judges this year are Tibor Fischer, Irenosen Okojie and Leone Ross.

Click below to enter your story online via our Submittable site:
submit

Entries can also be sent by post to:
VSP, The Royal Society of Literature
Somerset House, Strand
London, WC2R 1LA
Postal entries must be accompanied by a completed entry form (which also contains full rules and eligibility criteria). Download the application form.

The closing date for entries is Friday 29 June 2018.

2018 Bristol Short Story Prize

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With six weeks to go until our entry deadline we’d like to take the opportunity (thank you, the mighty Shortstops) to say that the 2018 Bristol Short Story Prize is open for entries, and we really, really do mean open.

We’ve published a huge range of stories in our first 10 anthologies – stories set throughout history from ancient Greece to the present day, and beyond to imagined futures. There have been stories narrated by octogenarians, by children not yet a decade old, and others with narrators and protagonists at all stages of life in between. Stories written in the first, second and third persons, with the broadest sweep of styles and genres from the familiar to the obscure: historical, romance, literary, science fiction, harsh realism, surreal flights of fancy, tense thrillers, comic capers, ‘experimental’ tales, sparsely written hammer blows of what some might call flash fiction and lots more. Stories set in countries all over the globe, written by writers worldwide.

There have been high, mid and low brow stories; stories written as blog posts, album reviews, in verse, as diaries, as a series of emails, as well as a sumptuous crop of the more traditional; stories of 4,000 words and those with just a few hundred, one of which won first prize in 2010.

Our 2017 winner, Dima Alzayat (centre) with awards ceremony guest speaker Edson Burton (left) and judging panel member, literary agent Juliet Pickering, who now represents Dima.

We invite you to show us what’s possible in a short story, what a short story can be, what a story can do and what ‘short story’ means to you. Drop our jaws, make us weep, make us rethink, tickle us, entertain us, confound us, provoke us, comfort us, stimulate us, challenge us, storify us to another time or place but above all we want to encourage and inspire you to feel free to write what you want in whatever form you want.

We won’t be compiling lists of shoulds and shouldn’ts on how or what to write. Another contribution to the vast muddle won’t help anyone, there’s more than enough out there. You’re the writer, it’s up to you what you do. It’s your story. We’ll read every submission with the same objectivity, respect and relish.

In short, then, there are no dos and don’ts, shoulds and shouldn’ts, rights and wrongs. No borders, no barriers, no walls.

With that in mind, here are some details of this year’s competition:

The 2018 Bristol Short Story Prize is open to all published and unpublished writers worldwide over 16 years of age. Stories can be on any theme or subject and entry can be made online via the website or by post. Entries must be previously unpublished with a maximum length of 4,000 words (There is no minimum). The entry fee is £8 per story.
The closing date for entries is midnight (BST) May 1st 2018.

20 stories will be shortlisted and the 20 shortlisted writers will be invited to the 2018 awards ceremony in Bristol in October this year when the winners will be announced and this year’s anthology launched.  Prizes will be sent to any writer unable to attend the awards ceremony.

Prizes:
1st £1000, 2nd £700, 3rd £400. 17 further prizes of £100 will be presented to the writers whose stories appear on the shortlist. All 20 shortlisted writers will have their stories published in the Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology Volume 11.

And here is our amazing judging panel: Kate Johnson (literary agent at Mackenzie Wolf), Lucy Cowie (editor and former literary agent), Roshi Fernando (writer), and Polly Ho-Yen (writer)

Full details and rules are available at www.bristolprize.co.uk

 

 

 

2018 Flash Fiction Competition

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The Casket of Fictional Delights

Launched as part of the nationwide Get Creative Festival. We are looking for entries with a maximum of 300 words (excluding title). The competition is open to anyone over 18.

Judge: David Gaffney
Closing date: 31st May 2018

Entry

£5 per Flash Fiction. 

Prizes                

  • The winning Flash Fiction will receive £150.
  • The top Eight Flash Fictions will be published online on The Casket of Fictional Delights
  • The top Four Flash Fictions will be professionally recorded and broadcast in a special audio podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, TuneIn and Stitcher, promoted by The Casket of Fictional Delights.

Full set of Rules and writing Tips available on the website.

Judge David Gaffney has the following advice –

“I do not expect to understand it at first. I expect to be a little confused. I hope to be a little confused. I will expect to have to read it again, and maybe again after that. And the feeling I want to have after finishing it is a feeling that I have understood something I didn’t understand before but I still don’t really know what it is.”

Enter

Good Luck Everyone

#FindYourStory

 

New Writing Competition for Warwickshire

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The hour-long Stratford Words radio programme has announced a free-to-enter SHORT STORY COMPETITION for residents of Warwickshire and Coventry. The title of the comp is A Certain Age, but it’s up to you what that age is and how you interpret it. Closing date is Sunday 20th May, max 3000 words, free to enter, fifty quid prize, (FIFTY QUID!!), twenty and ten pound book tokens for the runner-ups, publication in The Love Hope & Peace Journal – and – you get to read your story live on air on July 1st, in lovely Stratford upon Avon, during the River Festival. Click the link above to download your entry form, so that you can fill it out and send it off along with your fabulous short story to those lovely people at Stratford Words on Welcombe Radio. Email only folks, we can’t do paper as we haven’t got a letter box.

Subscribe and enter our Short fiction competition for free – judge Nicholas Royle

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The deadline is fast approaching for our biennial Poetry & Short fiction competition

Brittle Star-competition 2018

We hope you’re thinking of entering because we love to read your entries – and it’s also a massive help to the magazine because all money raised goes back into production (after we’ve paid the prizes and the main judges’ fees, of course).

As always, if you’re a subscriber you get your 2nd entry for FREE (you can even take out a new subscription today and get your 2nd entry free), but for the first time ever if you become a Brittle Star Patron you get your first entry for FREE. Visit our Patreon page to find out how you can become a Patron for as little as £1 a month, giving you access to the lovely rewards and treats that we give our Patrons as a special thanks for supporting us.

The normal cost of entry is only £5 for the 1st entry then £3.50 for any following entries – which is really good value anyway, but not as good as free!

The deadline for the competition is 14th March. The first prize in each category is £250, plus publication in the magazine, a subscription for you to keep for yourself or give to a friend, and an invitation to read at our launch and Prize-Giving at the Barbican Centre Library in London.

Pascale PetitNicholas RoyleJacqueline GabbitasThe judges this year are the brilliant Pascale Petit and Nicholas Royle (and our own Jacqueline Gabbitas). Pascale is an award winning poet, 4-times shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize. Her most recent collection, Mama Amazonica (Bloodaxe, 2017), was a Poetry Book Society Choice. Nicholas is a novelist and short story writer. His most recent collection is Ornithology (Confingo, 2017). He is well known as the series editor of Best British Short Stories (Salt).

To find out more about the competition, including the rules and T&Cs, and to enter click on the big bright orange link HERE!

MEET THE WINNERS!

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Words and Women are excited to announce the winners of their 2017/2018 national and KerryHood[50180]regional new writing competition.

Kerry Hood’s intriguing and ambitious short story, The Sunbathers, wins the national prize for women over 40, £1,000 and a month-long writing retreat at Church Cottage, Stratford-Upon-Avon, generously sponsored by Hosking Houses Trust.

Margaret Meyer has been awarded the East of England regional prize of £600 and a mentoring session with Gold Dust for her entry, The Once and Only First Lady Judge.

Guest judges, Emily Midorikawa and Emma Claire Sweeney were drawn to Hood’s voice which ‘felt original and full of verve,’ as well as the ‘thematically complex’ nature of the story

Kerry Hood is no stranger to competitions.  She has been shortlisted for the Bridport Prize five times, as well as broadcasting stories on BBC Radio 4.  She is an accomplished theatre writer with work produced at the Soho Theatre, and her play Meeting Myself Coming Back was selected as the Sunday Times Critics’ Choice. She has had residences at the National Theatre, Traverse and RADA.

rgaret Meyer has previously been a fiction editor, publisher, British Council Director of Literature and a reader-in-residence in Norfolk prisons. As a therapeutic arts practitioner she provides writing and reading-for-wellbeing programmes for ex-offenders. In 2016 she won a place on the Escalator writer development scheme run by Writers’ Centre Norwich and in 2017 she was awarded an Arts Council England grant towards her first novel, The Varieties of Flight.

The competition now in its fifth year and open to women writers is unusual because it offers an opportunity to enter not only fiction but non-fiction, memoir, and life-writing.  This years’ winning texts will appear alongside past successful entrants in a compendium of the best of women’s contemporary short prose, launched on International Women’s Day, March 8th, 2018.

‘Congratulations to our worthy winning writers.  We had 350 entries and picking the most distinctive and ambitious texts was no easy task.  We are grateful to our brilliant judges for making such bold selections, and we really look forward to launching our compendium which will feature not only this year’s compelling and engaging writing but the best of the best in past years,’ said Belona Greenwood, co-organiser of Words and Women.

‘It has been a very exciting year for women’s writing,’ said Lynne Bryan, co-organiser. ‘We are extremely grateful to our sponsors. Hosking Houses Trust is a unique charity which offers women over the age of 40 time in which to start, continue or complete interesting or innovative work, in a residency free from the pressures of everyday life.  Jill Dawson, author of nine novels and founder of Gold Dust mentoring scheme is a wonderful supporter of our regional award.

See Words and Women’s blog for more details. Words and Women

 

‘The Squat Pen Rests’ Short Story Writing Competition

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squat-pen-rests-large

 Grab your hats, coats, shoes and socks and be sure to wipe your calendars clean for the evening of Friday 26th January 2018.

Why?

Because on that night ‘The Squat Pen Rests’ Short Story Spoken Word Event will be barrelling into the Wyvern Theatre, Swindon, with a freshly sharpened pencil clamped between its teeth, and brandishing a proper-fancy gaggle of fabulous stories for anyone brave enough to pitch up and listen.

Six  super-fine short story writers will duke it out in front of a live audience to find out who will be crowned the very first ever ‘The Squat Pen Rests’ Writing Competition Champion of the World!

There will be prizes, live music, a bar, some occasional bawdiness and, of course, those six spoken word performers who will have travelled from far and wide (maybe even further) in pursuit of the Holy Grail that is ‘The Squat Pen Rests’ Writing Competition Champion of the World title.

The game’s afoot: and upon this charge (just £5.50 per ticket), cry ‘gimme one!’ (or maybe two) to secure your seats.

Click here to buy your tickets.

 

Meanwhile…

‘The Squat Pen Rests’ is actively seeking writer-performers. So, if you’d like to be in with a chance of performing your story on the night (and winning fifty smackers, to boot) then we’d love to hear from you. All you have to do is follow the link for further details. The Squat Pen Rests Writing Competition

And when does this glorious event take place, I hear you roar. Well, because you’ve roared so nicely, I’ll tell you.

The date is Friday 28th January 2018. Doors will open at 7.30pm and the readings will commence around 8pm. Closing time is ‘late’. 

And Where, pray tell, doth this event take place? 

All right Shakespeare, keep your hair on. I’ll tell you where:

The Place – Wyvern Theatre,

Theatre Square,

Swindon SN1 1QN

01793 524481

For all other enquiries please email: stephentuffin@hotmail.com

 

 

UK/Turkey Short Story Competition

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Filed under Competitions

UK/Turkey Short Story Competition

The British Council in Turkey aims to build a bridge between Turkish and UK writers, facilitate dialogue between literary professionals in both countries, and create a platform to showcase works by Turkish and British writers to new audiences.

To support this initiative, the British Council is launching a short story competition, on the theme of ‘diversity’, in partnership with two literary institutions: ITEF -Istanbul Tanpınar Literature Festival in Turkey, and Word Factory in the UK.

The winner will have the opportunity to work with Word Factory and The British Council and have their story published on a new British Council digital platform, alongside specially-commissioned stories by established authors from Turkey and the UK. The winning writer will receive £300 and will see their short story translated into Turkish accompanied by a specially commissioned illustration.

Eligibility Criteria

  • Entry is free
  • Writers must be based in the UK, writing in English
  • One story submission per writer
  • Writers must be at least 18 years old, and ‘early-career’ (may have had single stories published on printed or online media, but not a full collection, or novel). Stories should be 1,500 words or less
  • Stories should be broadly themed on the concept of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (though we welcome original and unusual takes on this theme). Please check the British Council website for further information about the British Council’s approach to EDI. 
  • The competition is open to all fiction genres
  • By submitting a story, you agree that it may be edited (with your final approval) by Word Factory prior to publication
  • Submission deadline is midnight 31 December 2017
  • By submitting a story, you agree that you have read and accept the full terms and conditions (see below)

The winner will be chosen by a panel from The British Council and Word Factory and announced by 28 February 2018 on the British Council website.

Please fill out the form and submit your application.

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