Station Books Short Story Competition
Theme: Acceptance. At Station Books we strive to create a space where everyone feels welcome and accepted for who they are. We are a neurodiverse team from different backgrounds who love to talk about books with anyone who loves them as we do! Our theme for this competition is acceptance, something that we feel this ever-changing, challenging world needs more of. We're so excited to see what you produce!
Key dates
- Entries open: Sunday 1st March
- Entries closed: Sunday 12th April
- Shortlist announced: Sunday 26th April
- Winners announced: Friday 1st May (1 winner and 2 runners up)
Word count: 1,000 words max
Minimum age to enter: 16
Judge: Lesley Kara, author of The Rumour, Troublemaker, The Other Tenant and many more.
Prizes
1st place: £50 Station Books Voucher to be used in the shop and your short story published on our Instagram and in our newsletter. If our winner isn't local or able to collect their voucher in person, one will be emailed/sent to you to spend online.
2nd place: Your story to be published on our Instagram and in our newsletter.
3rd place: Your story to be published on our Instagram and in our newsletter.
Competition rules
- The competition is open to all writers from our community (including our volunteers) of any ability, published or otherwise, from anywhere in the UK. But you must follow Station Books on Instagram or be subscribed to our newsletter to be able to enter as this is where results will be published.
- You may enter once.
- Please submit your entry online to: holly@stationbooks.co.uk
- As we are a small shop, we will not be accepting any entries in person so please send them via email. Apologies to those technically adverse.
- Entries must have neither been previously published nor won a prize in any other competition.
- No story will win more than one prize.
- By entering the competition, you accept your work may be published online in our newsletter and our Instagram.
- Any work that appears to be written by AI will be disqualified.
Formatting rules
- All entries must be submitted in Word (Doc or Docx format).
- Entries should be easy for our judge to read: with double spaced lines, indented paragraphs, and using a standard font such as 12pt Times New Roman or Arial font.
- Label your entry with the title of your story on the entry form. Please do not put your name or any other information in the file name.
- Your word count must be exact and be on your entry form. Do not include the title, header or footer in the word count.
- If your entry is over the maximum word count it will be disqualified.
- Show your story title and page number at the top of every page.
- IMPORTANT: Do not write your name anywhere on the story. Stories will be judged anonymously. If you put your name anywhere other than the entry form, it will result in your story being disqualified.
Entry form — please include in the body of your email
- Name:
- Email address:
- Contact number:
- Title of piece:
- Word count:
- Confirm that you have read and agree to abide by the rules of entry.
Email to: holly@stationbooks.co.uk
Reminder: Put your story name and page number on each page of your story but do not put any other information on the pages of your story. Your name, contact details, story title and word count must be on the entry form and must be in the body of your email, but nowhere else for anonymity reasons.