by Georgina Crawford

Created on: May 19, 2010

Typing ‘short story competitions’ into Google returns something in the region of 904,000 entries, so there is a huge amount of scope for budding writers to show off their talent.  However, many of these will be Internet scams that are best avoided, so how does one discover which competitions to enter and which to leave alone?

Probably a good first place to start is to go to your high street newsagent and buy a selection of writers’ magazines.  Not only do these give good tips and information about how to make your mark in the publishing world, they also run competitions and provide lists of other organizations running competitions.  Magazines such as The Writers’ forum and Writing Magazine run a variety of monthly competitions on subjects such as short stories, poetry and flash fiction, with prizes up to £300.  Their websites are certainly worth browsing.

There is a small fee for entering these competitions, but even if you don’t win, your rejection letter is accompanied by a critique of the work that enables you to redraft the story and enter is elsewhere with an increased chance of winning.  If you are considering entering a piece, make sure to read the rules thoroughly first, as each magazine requires different things from the entrant; it would be a shame to have a story declined purely because of formatting errors.  Most magazines allow you to enter a manuscript online as well as by post; if you win they will publish your entry and send press releases to your local newspaper and radio station.

Women’s magazines such as Woman and Take a Break also welcome manuscripts. Although these aren’t strictly competitions, they are outlets that will publish unsolicited work and will pay for it, something that fewer and fewer magazines do now that economic times are hard.  As well as monthly magazines, these publications run fiction specials at various times of the year that will accept stories with a longer than usual word length.  In addition, if your work is accepted for Take a Break in the UK, for example, this may not preclude you for entering the same piece to Take a Break Australia, providing you have retained world rights; thus the same story could earn money several times.

Creative institutions sometimes run annual writing competitions, such as Academi in Wales and the Bridport competition.  Although the Bridport is UK based, the literary competition has a huge international following and accepts manuscripts from all over the world.  Short stories can be up to 5,000 words long, which is a nice length to play with, and the top prize money is £5,000, plus, there is media coverage in the international press.

Through reading the writers’ magazines and searching their websites, common publishing names will crop up over again, so that when you search for ‘short story competitions’ online you will be able to distinguish genuine publishers from the scammers who are only after your hard earned cash.  There are numerous bone fide online competitions out there, such as Accentuate Writers’ Forum, a website that regularly runs writing competitions and which offers good prize money.

Any costs involved in buying magazines, sending off manuscripts and competition entrance fees are tax deductible, and are best viewed as a necessary part of learning your craft and researching your subject.  They are all part of finding a short story competition format that works for you.  Good luck!

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