Writing Competitions to Enter in November

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Bath Children's Novel Award, Betty Trask, Caledonia Novel Award, Cinnamon Press Awards, Fish Short Story Prize, NAWG Open Competitions for Short Story, Paul Torday Memorial Prize, prize, Scribble Annual Short Story Competition, The Commonwealth Short Story Prize, The Poetry Kit Autumn Competition

November. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. Of curling up by the fireside and reading story books. Or – better still – of sitting by the fireside and composing your very own stories…

The Commonwealth Short Story Prize, open to all Commonwealth writers, is for a story of 2,000-5,000 words. Prizes: £5,000; £2,500. Entry is free. Deadline 1 November. Details from http://www.commonwealthwriters.org/cssp-2020

Scribble Annual Short Story Competition. Maximum 3,000 words on the theme of DECEPTION. Entry is £4, but free to subscribers. Prizes: £100, £50, £25. Deadline 1 November. Details: parkpublications.co.uk/competitions.html

Caledonia Novel Award for the first 20 pages plus a 200-word synopsis of a novel by an unpublished writer. Prizes: £1,500, trophy. Entry fee: £25. Closing date: 1 November. Details: http://www.caledoniannovelaward.com

Paul Torday Memorial Prize for a first (published) novel by a writer 60 and over. Prizes: £1,000. Free entry. Closing Date: 15 November. Details: http://www.societyofauthors.org

Bath Children’s Novel Award for unpublished and independently published children’s novels. Send first 5,000 words and synopsis. Prizes: £2,500, feedback, Cornerstones online course. Entry fee: £25. Closing date: 17 November. Details: http://www.bathnovelaward.co.uk

The Poetry Kit Autumn Competition for a poem of any length. Entry: £3.50; £8 for three; £10 for five. Deadline: 20 November. Prizes: £100, £50. Details: poetry-kit.org.

National Association of Writers’ Groups Open Competitions for Short Story/Poem on the theme of BETRAYAL. Prizes for each category: £200, £100, £50. Entry fee: £5. Deadline 30 November. Details: nawg.co.uk/competitions

Fish Short Story Prize. Word limit 5,000 words. Prizes: 3,000 Euros; Week at Anam Cara Writers’ Retreat; 300 Euros; 200 Euros for 7 runners-up. The 10 best submissions will be published in the Fish Anthology 2020. Entry is 20 Euros (12 Euros for subsequent). Deadline 30 November. Details: http://www.fishpublishing.com

Betty Trask Prize for published or unpublished, traditional or romantic (not experimental) first novels by authors under the age of 35. Prizes: £20,000 total, to be used for foreign travel. Free entry. Deadline: 30 November. Details: http://www.society ofauthors.org

Cinnamon Press Awards for 10 poems, 2 short stories or up to 10,000 words of a novel. Prizes: publishing contract. Entry fee: £16. Deadline: 30 November. Details: http://www.cinnamonpress.com

The above competitions pretty much offer something for everyone, so please curl up by that fireside and get composing, or revising, or editing…

Just remember to carefully check all entry details before doing so.

Competition 2019 – judging begins

Many thanks to everyone who entered our 2019 competition.  We will now roll up our sleeves, fasten our reading glasses on firmly, and start deliberations.  The differences in our opinions is always a reminder that competitions are sometimes about ‘hitting the spot’ with a majority of judges.  There will be hot discussion!

We plan to release our shortlist in mid-November.

National Bookshop Day

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Bookshops, Daunt's Bookshop, Libraries, London

Let’s all raise a glass in praise of our wonderful bookshops. Along with libraries, they are the best friends of all readers and writers.

My other half and I spent time (and a modest amount of money) in Daunt’s Bookshop in London yesterday. A magical place in Marylebone..

It is tempting to save a pound or two by buying books from Amazon – though by the time you’ve added postage, the difference may not be great – but let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot by making book selling on the high street uneconomic. We don’t want to deny ourselves the thrill of one day seeing our own efforts on public display, do we?

 

National Poetry Day

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National Poetry Day, Richard Jago, William Shakespeare

 

 

With National Poetry Day in mind, we thought you might enjoy a poem from The Faber Book of Parodies, edited by Simon Brett, and written in tribute to our famous Bard.

 

HAMLET’S SOLILOQUY IMITATED

Richard Jago

To print, or not to print—that is the question.
Whether ‘tis better in a trunk to bury
The quirks and crotchets of outrageous fancy,
Or send a well-wrote copy to the press,
And by disclosing, end them? To print, to doubt
No more; and by one act to say we end
The head-ach, and a thousand natural shocks
Of scribbling frenzy—’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To print—to beam
From the same shelf with Pope, in calf well bound!
To sleep, perchance, with Quarles—Ay there’s the rub –
For to what class a writer may be doom’d,
When he hath shuffled off some paltry stuff,
Must give us pause.—There’s the respect that makes
Th’ unwilling poet keep his piece nine years.
For who would bear th’ impatient thirst of fame,
The pride of conscious merit, and ‘bove all,
The tedious importunity of friends,
When as himself might his quietus make
With a bare inkhorn? Who would fardles bear?
To groan and sweat under a load of wit?
But that the tread of steep Parnassus’ hill,
That undiscover’d country, with whose bays
Few travellers return, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear to live unknown,
Than run the hazard to be known, and damn’d.
Thus critics do make cowards of us all.
And thus the healthful face of many a poem
Is sickly’d o’er with a pale manuscript;
And enterprisers of great fire, and spirit,
With this regard from Dodsley turn away,
And lose the name of authors.

 

Writing Competitions to Enter in October

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2020 Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers Award, 2020 Debra Rogers Foundation Writers Award, Cinnamon Pencil Mentoring Competition, Dalkey Creates Writing Festival, Lichfield Cathedral Poetry Festival Poetry Competition, McKitterick Prize, Retreat West, SWC International Short Story Competition, Tom Gallon Trust Awards

Light in Our Darkness is the theme for The Word Poetry Competition, which is part of the first Lichfield Cathedral Poetry Festival, inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Moon landings. The first prize is £100, second prize of £50 and third of £25 in the age categories of 17-25 and 26 and over. The winners will also be displayed in Lichfield Cathedral. Poems should be original, unpublished poems that use ideas around creation, cosmology, space travel and astronomical discovery and reflect the origins of the universe and space, light and time. All poems must have a title. Entry is free. The deadline is 3 October and details can be found at: http://www.lichfield-cathedral.org/journeys/the-word-poetry-competition

The Dalkey Creates Writing Festival international contest is for short stories up to 2,000 words and poems up to 30 lines, with winners in each category receiving 1,000 Euros. The entry fee is 15 Euros and the closing date 6 October. Details: http://www.dalkeycreates.com

Virginia Prize for Fiction, for unpublished novels, at least 45,000 words, by women. Prizes: Development and publication of the winning novel. Entry fee: £25. Closing date: 1 October. TODAY! Details: https://aurorametro-com/virginia-prize-for-fiction/

Imison Award for original radio plays by writers new to radio. Prizes: £3,000. Closing date: 6 October. FREE ENTRY. Details: http://www.societyofauthors.org

London Short Story Prize for stories up to 5,000 words by writers with London postcodes. Prizes: £1,000, 2x£250. Entry fee: £10. Closing date: 7 October. Details: http://www.spreadtheword.org.uk

Bath Flash Fiction Award for up to 300 words. Prizes: £1,000, £300, £100, 2x£30. Entry fee: £7.50, £12 for 2, £18 for 3. Closing date: 13 October. Details: bathflashfictionaward.com

Retreat West fiction for up to 500 words; short stories 1,500-5,000 words. Prizes: flash: £350, £200, £100, £15 for each shortlisted; short stories: £400, £250, £150, £20 each shortlisted. Entry fee: £8 flash; £10 short story. Closing date: 27 October. Details: http://www.retreatwest.co.uk

Cinnamon Pencil Mentoring Competition. 10 poems, two short stories, or the first 10,000 words of a novel. Prize: a place on the Cinnamon Pencil mentoring scheme. Entry fee: £12. Closing date: 30 October. Details: http://www.cinnamonpress.com

The 2020 Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers Award has a first prize of £10,000 for an unpublished book by a first time writer. Runners up will receive £1,000. This bi-annual competition, in memory of the agent who founded the agency that became Rogers Coleridge White, wants the first 20,000-25,000 words of a work in progress, plus a synopsis and a biographical note. There is no entry fee, but writers must reside in the United Kingdom or the British Commonwealth. They can submit one work only and must not have published a full-length work or be under contract to a publisher. The deadline is 31 October and details can be found at http://www.deborahrogersfoundation.org

Bedford International Writing Competition for short stories up to 3,000 words, poems up to 40 lines. Prizes: each category £300, £150, £100. Entry fee: £6, £12 for three. Closing date: 31 October. Details: http://www.bedfordwritingcompetition.co.uk

McKitterick Prize for the best first novel, published or unpublished, by an author over the age of 40 on 31 December. Prizes: £4,000. FREE ENTRY. Deadline: 31 October. Details: http://www.societyofauthors.org

Southport Writers’ Circle is inviting entries for their SWC International Short Story Competition for stories up to 2,000 words on any theme. As well as the first prize of £150, there are second and third prizes of £80 and £30. Entry is £3 per story, or four for £10. Closing date is 31 October. Details: http://www.swconline.co.uk

Tom Gallon Trust Awards for short stories up to 5,000 words by authors who have had at least one story accepted for publication. Prizes: £1,000, £500 runner-up. FREE ENTRY. Details: http://www.societyofauthors.org

Carmarthen Book Fair Short Story Competition. Short stories for adults, 1,200-1,500 words. Prizes: £100, £50. Entry fee: £3, £5 for two. Closing date: 31 October. Details: http://www.facebook.com/CarmarthenBookFair 2016/

Please, as ever, check that I have all the entry details correct. Entering competitions is a good thing – even if you don’t win, you hone your craft and, hopefully, have fun.

With regard to our own competition, we are busily reading entries and will soon be able to give a date when we will announce the result of our deliberations. With Skipper insisting we be dogged in our efforts. Many thanks to those who entered.