Competitions
Below are some free current competitions you could enter!
Scottish Book Trust - 50-word stories
https://www.scottishbooktrust.com/50-word-fiction
This is a monthly flash fiction competition . Entrants submit 50 word stories on preset themes. Ocotber 2023 stories had to feature a black cat! Here are some of our entries..
She hopped and trotted down beside her friend into the alleyway, illuminated by streetlights against the red-brick wall. Her friend licked his paw. She pounced at him, ha! But he seemed not to notice and padded silently into darkness so she sighed, and disappeared once more. Unseen shadow cat.
Harriet McGonigal
The darkness always leaves and returns again.
Walking around, from town to town, it follows like a bad stench.
The black, sticky fleece floods your brain.
Its shrieks of warning curse your name.
“Leave us, let us go” they all say.
Prancing steps fade away, until the darkness comes again.
Ella Horner
Witchcraft is near.
Fire and brimstone fall upon the streets, trailing the heels of the feline beast. An unearthly shriek rips itself from the thing’s charcoal maw, tearing through the cobbles, maleifica at the paw.
People retreat, distrust in their eyes, for someone amidst us is the Devil’s new bride.
Trinity Paterson
Solstice Prize
Organised by Writing East Midlands, this nature-themed writing competition was open to writers aged 7 to 17; click into the website to find examples of previous winning entries,https://writingeastmidlands.co.uk/young-writers-groups/solstice-writing-prize/
See below some of our entries for this competition..
Berry Picking (Poppy Burton)
A worn and torn picture,
Bent at the corners,
Taped in a scrapbook,
A life with no traumas
Strawberries and raspberries,
In a woven basket,
Two smiling best friends,
Laid on a picnic blanket.
Covered in cloth,
Are the thorns and thistles,
A two-person braid train,
A hairbrush with bristles,
Flour dusts the kitchen counter,
As well as the rolling pin,
A flattened piece of pastry
-unbelievably thin,
The hot oven smoke
Hits our rosy cheeks,
That sweet baking smell,
Nothing could be bleak.
……
Many years later,
In a bright and airy house,
Two smiling best friends,
Quiet as a mouse.
A surprise on the horizon,
A recreation (if you will),
Of the picture in the scrapbook,
On the same flowered hill.
New strawberries and raspberries,
In that same woven basket,
The grown smiling best friends,
On a worn picnic blanket.
Covered in cloth again,
Are new thorns and thistles,
That same braid train,
With new brushes and bristles,
That same woven basket,
Full of strawberries and raspberries,
Two sets of smiling best friends,
Cheeks red as cherries.
Jackie: (Olivia Robson)
I excitedly watch the plastic pop off the cardboard. My carving tools that Mummy bought for me come spilling into my hands.
‘These are sharp, Leo. Please be careful.’ Mummy speaks firmly to me, and I excited respond with an nod before parking myself on the cold grass in front of Jackie.
Jackie is my pumpkin friend. Mummy and I had gone to the pumpkin patch earlier today to get a Jackie because I had never made my own pumpkin before. It had rained a few hours before, and Mummy had help me to put on my wellie boots before I could go pumpkin hunting.
She paid for the little pieces of paper that let us in and I immediately began scanning the fields in search of my Jackie.
The patch had many a kind; big ones, small ones, yellow ones, green ones, even long ones. However, none looked how my Jackie should have looked. Then, Mummy pointed out a huge willow tree which stood proudly in the middle of the muddy ocean. It’s leaves of Paris green fell delicately to the left, and they swung in the autumn breeze as if dancing to the tune of mother nature.
I trudged over to the tree, hoping that my Jackie was waiting for me.
Mummy pulled back the long, arched branches and I hurried inside. There, sitting on the roots of the tree, with mud hugging the bottom, was a perfectly-proportionate pumpkin: tiger orange skin, plump and strong, with a little green leaf hat resting on the left half of it’s head.
That was my Jackie.
The wind rushed through my hair as I ran to scoop her up. It slipped into my arms, and I held on tight. Mummy reached for her camera, ‘Let’s keep this picture of you and Jackie forever’. I smile wide, and hold Jackie up like a teddy bear, telling her to smile just like me. The willows sway around us, like a wind chime playing gentle melodies. Mummy smiles lovingly at my picture, and I beg her to let me take Jackie home.
Now, I watch as Mummy draws on a big smile, circle eyes and a little triangular nose. She hands me a wooden ladle, and I waste no time pulling out all of the merigold pulp and seeds from Jackie. I want to make her as perfect as possible. After I finish, Mummy hands me a black sharpie, ‘Make her your Jackie now’. So, I use all my effort to keep the pen straight to make two circular eyes, a little triangular nose and, the most important, a big perky smile. Mummy takes Jackie from me, and cuts each part of her out as carefully as possible.
She tells me to close my eyes, and when I open them again, I see Jackie, exactly how I wanted her, sitting alongside the pesky daisies that Daddy thinks make the lawn look messy.
Jackie doesn’t look messy, though, Jackie looks perfect.
I love my Jackie.
Burned Scars (Miruna Cristache)
The skies are burning.
Souls lost, buried deep within ashes
While we can only dream of an escape,
An escape only the Gods could command
Time is but a mere concept.
Forsakened by our own Mother,
We are no longer loved, yet we feel the burn,
Agony lingers through the soot embedded bark.
Our cold-blooded relatives no longer linger.
They slither under us, their skins burning,
Our aerial neighbours fled long before,
Long before the feverous tragedies began.
After all this time they haven’t learned.
Learned the source of the Flames,
Of Her
And so she rages on still
Wailing her deathly curse throughout the land.
Burning months stretch.
Escaping boundaries across seasons,
Our home is incinerated;
We no longer live across greenery.
Flora and fauna.
We are battling to survive,
We are still hanging on,
And yet all is in vain
The skies are burning.
And we all perish away
Slowly, but surely,
Extinction is inevitable.
Foraging (Eric Watson)
Ten nights ago, I wandered through the ravaged planes of thorn and bramble. My friend and I couldn’t contain our tenacity for a naive, clueless and intrusive escapade into the unknown. What I’m about to share is not just my warning but also my eulogy and goodbye to those I loved. It won’t quite make sense, but I’m already gone now. May you reach peace with your gods and make the most of your time on Earth. Because they are always going to be lingering around waiting to snatch your breath at any given point, at any given moment. With every: open door, every open closet and every open curtain there is a window of opportunity for them to cut you out of your world. So be brave, and listen to everything, focus on the sounds that you ignore and repress because there lies your one and only opportunity to react and run for your life. React and run.
I’m barely awake now. The monotonous blaring tone of the alarm had seeped its way into my dream. Usually what I dream surpasses what I wake up to and confront in my day. When I dream, I feel like I’m drowning in a pool of repressed thoughts and emotions. It’s like being a small child again, where everything is either colourful and cheery or a reimagining of Dante’s inferno: being hogtied and cooked alive in the crucible of hell. All the categories of my dreams enticed me. Like when your dad implores little five-year-old you to not go into his private study no matter what. Even specifying the consequences in a long consecutive order. Suddenly, it’s as if you were a pirate setting sail for lost treasure and then persecuted on home soil.
As I expanded my eyelids, I saw a hazy glaze across my line of sight signifying that this was in fact the real deal. If I had a penny for every single time I was lulled into believing I was awake only to find out I was in yet another episode of Inception I’d probably be still dreaming because nobody gets rewarded for symptoms of mental distress and lethargy.
I was up, a small needle in a large haystack. My room is a mess. I read somewhere that messy rooms make you more creative. I’d hate to meet the joker that published that article.
So I got some of my things organised.. My morning: clothes, morning axe and morning shield ready to fight for the brethren tribe ‘Skjöldung!’
It’s my everyday routine..
CARRION ANGEL (Laura Thompson)
Hunter. Will you chase the smell
Of death?
Will you trail me
Limping, to my place of
Self-exile.
I’ve buried myself in the woods
Under ferns, I melt into the soil
To listen to the river turn cold.
If you can beat the beagles and top
hats then I'll be here waiting.
Baited, in a tangy scent you know all too well.
What if I drifted in space instead,
Losing my sanguinity in peace.
Would that make it easier to find me?
I am like Saturn and her many rings
The way you run circles around me
The cosmos is a forest of glittering stars
How desperately I wish to shine.
I want to be in the clouds, with
The gods, forcing down biblical rain like knives.
I have become a carrion angel
A golden heart encased in rot and sin
Crashing down through my bed of sticks
To make myself a part of the earth.
It's rivers flowing hot like blood
And flowers bursting out like hair
That scars the ground with its
Abundance. The world must die,
And die again, before it is
Nothing. It is beautiful, and
Foul inside - but cased with a new
Kind of pretty, one even you might be able to find.
Pathetic Fallacy (Phoebe Panton)
The weather speaks in volumes,
A breeze is worth a thousand words,
It sighs, whispers, whistles, howls,
And paints depth into written worlds.
Books open on a graveyard,
With full moon watching from the dark,
And ghostly fogs haunting us,
Tales of horror leave their mark.
A novel starts with dawning,
Hopefulness rising with the sun,
A clear sky free from worry,
Our hero’s story just begun.
A poem speaks of weather,
And in sixteen lines shows its worth,
As a literary aid,
To budding writers on this earth.
Crash (Tess Deere)
‘Another one bites the dust!’ He chuckled, as he dropped the fearsome silver monster; wiping his hands on his denim-covered thighs.
A chorus of animals responded, a deafening cacophony of squawking and squeaking ringing in his ears. He tutted as the birds escaped to the sky, their inky presence dirtying the brilliant blue.
Squeak.
The noise drew his attention, his head whipping around. Obsidian eyes stared into his. A fierce determination shone in them, refusing to be shunned by their darkness. Despite its significant height disadvantage, the little creature looked down its nose at him; unable to control its defiant twitching.
Squeak.
He got the distinct impression that had it been able to, the creature would’ve growled with some ferocity. A myriad of emotions swirled through him- cleaving into his brain like an axe. Shame trickled through him, while anger stayed lodged in his head, dragging together his brow and drawing out a huff of frustration.
Squeak.
The eye contact finally broke, the beastie turning away in a flash of fur and brush tail. He blinked, and the creature was scurrying away, nimbly navigating the forest.
Oh no you don’t! He thought- not sparing a second before taking off after it. Clumsy feet, destroying and decimating, crashed through the woods; a discordant note against the tittering of insects. He heard the river before he saw it, glinting silver ripples seeming to smirk at him as he cursed the blasted squirrel. Aha! A fallen tree lounged across the river upstream. It wasn’t quite as sturdy as he would’ve liked, but he was willing to risk it. Stepping onto the rotting bark, his eyes glittered as he tested its strength.
Crack.
His eyes shot to the trunk below his feet, only having time to widen slightly before the tree went tumbling into the river. Desperately attempting to regain his balance, he splashed and spluttered on the river bank, sodden mud seeming to liquify by the second.
Splash!
He thrashed, muscles screaming at the frigid water enveloping his skin. Eventually, he stood. Turning, he glanced at a family of beavers scampering away- desperate to avoid him. Gleaming water dripped from his skin, escaping his fury as quickly as possible. He strengthened his resolve, and waded out of the river- cursing those beavers. He wasn’t that scary, was he? His target flashed across his line of sight. Powerful legs thundered after it, forcing through the brush to challenge the audacious little creature. It taunted him, zig-zagging forward and backward through well-worn paths, seeming to say hello to every animal it passed.
He stopped.
Breathing in the crisp, clear air; he tuned in to the soaring of birds, wings flapping as they bolted for freedom. His eyes came into a clearer focus, honing in on the burrowing of ants under his feet- struggling to find safety underground. He quickly shifted, stumbling backwards in his effort to avoid hurting any of them. A sudden gush of wind and rustle of leaves had him whipping around, barely catching sight of the frantic golden doe.
Squeak.
He looked up. A smile tugged at his lips as he gazed into those inky black eyes. Reluctantly, he trudged back to the fallen mighty tree he had slaughtered only minutes prior. ‘I’m sorry,’ he thought, wincing as he sunk to rest on the solid trunk. And there he stayed, appreciating the symphony of nature playing out before him.
Write on Art
Write on Art is an annual national writing competition sponsored by Art UK and the Paul Mellon Centre to encourage an interest in art history among young people. To enter, you must be aged 15 to 18 and live in England, Wales, Northern Ireland or Scotland; choose one artwork from artuk.org that fascinates you. For details and guidelines see https://artuk.org/learn/what-is-write-on-art
One Teen Story https://one-story.com/write/one-teen-story-contest/
One Teen Story publishes 3 stories a year and accepts submissions from teen writers ages 13-19. Visit our past issues page.For our One Teen Story contest, we ask writers ages 13-19 to enter their original, unpublished fiction. We are interested in great short stories of any genre about the teen experience—literary, fantasy, sci-fi, love stories, horror, etc. What’s in a great short story? Interesting teen characters, strong writing, and a beginning, middle, and end.
The winning stories will be published in forthcoming issues of One Teen Story, which will reach over ten thousand readers. The contest winners will receive $500 upon publication and 25 copies of the magazine featuring their work. The contest winners will also have the opportunity to work with a One Teen Story editor prior to publication. Honourable mentions will be chosen in three age categories: 13-15, 16-17, and 18-19, and each will be announced on our website, by email announcement, and on social media.
Closes November 27 2023.
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Previous Winners
Eleven Things You Don’t Remember (Oliver Reimers) excerpt
1
The start of it all. Both of us thirteen. Running through orchards hung with peaches as big as your fist. You’d nip the skin of the fruit and laugh when juice burst in your face, collected in droplets on your chin. Afternoons painted colors of marmalade and spices—those were the days we laid under trees, our baskets filled with the day’s harvest, the seasons of peaches and yams blurring together. This is a place I remember through taste; when I bite into the warmth of a peach pie, I see the wrought iron gate, the path to the door led under curved branches of autumn trees.
Back there, in that orchard, is where you came and left my life as quick as a breath.
2
You and your mother rented the granny flat behind our house, down the dirt road from the “town” that was nothing more than a cluster of five buildings. Still, you always dressed as if you were about to set out on an adventure: boots laced to the point of restricting your blood flow, satchel stuffed with a compass and a pocketknife and who knows what, your newsboy cap secured on your head. That day, we were off to the pond to catch crawdads.
The Dangers of Pitying the Devil (Saskia de Leeuw Kyle) - excerpt
I haven’t spoken to Caspian Green in three years. I’ve tried not to even look at him since the last day of middle school. Occasionally, I find myself glancing at him out of the corner of my eye, sneaking a look and mapping the features of the face I used to know so well. But he’s changed so much in the three years we’ve been apart that I barely recognize him.
He has the faintest stubble gracing his jawline now, and his shoulders are wider. He’s always wearing that stupid letterman jacket, as if the rest of us will forget the place he holds on the social hierarchy. However, there are things about him that haven’t changed. His dark green eyes still brighten in the sun, his golden blond hair still falls in his face when he’s looking down at his desk. He still pays full attention in maths class even though the rest of his teammates and clique barely even look at the teacher.
Where I was the guy who focused in English, he was the maths whiz out of the two of us, so it’s nice to know that’s still remained the same.
Locker Room Talk (Elliot Park) - excerpt
As soon as I reach the end of the lane, I’m out. I push up from the bottom of the pool and pull myself over onto the deck. My knee hits the ground right where it’s already bruised, gray and dark. It’s fine, though, doesn’t hurt very much anymore. I just get to my feet, a bit shaky and sore from the earlier freestyle sprints. I grab my water bottle, goggles, and cap. Wave at Coach before heading out into the hallway. He’d only asked the boys to pick up after practice, just like usual. He might have given some of the girls a hard time for putting the kickboards back. He likes to say that “the boys should always take care of the girls.” Usually I’d just ignore him and grab the most boards I could possibly carry and put them back, spending a bit more time to make sure they’re neatly arranged (can’t really stand them being all over the place). But today’s an aerobics class day, so all the older women have been patiently waiting on the side benches for practice to be finished and the lane lines to be taken out. Given the choice, I usually prefer getting the lines.
Leftovers (Zach Miano) - excerpt
It is clear he won’t return tonight either. It’s already past eight-thirty and the street lights are on, revealing moths and tiny flies and making that buzzing sound that accompanies my thoughts when I can’t sleep. Aguilar’s wheelless caravan lights are on too, just like they have been every night since the factory had to lay off some workers. There is no way Papá will come home tonight. I have been waiting for his return for months, ever since the mold from the bathroom window began creeping down the wall.
Mamá always says to me, “You’re gonna learn to do work around the house and not be spoiled like Xavi and Clara.” So I have reluctantly accepted my job of cleaning the bathroom every evening just before preparing dinner, which I actually enjoy. Mostly I just scrub the sink and toilet, but once every couple of days I mop all the floors and clean the windows. I’ve decided to let the mold grow until Papá returns. I know he will not return tonight, yet while setting the table, I still take out his special square plate and set it on the short end of the kitchen table, where he always sits.