2014 Summer Shorts Writing Contest

The Virginia Writers Club’s Spring Shorts Contest is being renamed the Summer Shorts Contest and is being moved a bit later in the year than the previous Spring Shorts contest. Please read the guidelines listed below for more information.

Note: Only members of the statewide Virginia Writers Club who have paid their membership dues for 2014 may enter the contest.

Categories
Fiction - A short story not to exceed 1,200 words
Non-fiction - A personal essay not to exceed 1,200 words
Poetry - Any form not to exceed 30 lines

Guidelines

• Only members of the statewide Virginia Writers Club who have paid their membership dues for 2014 may enter the contest.
• Entries, sent electronically, will be accepted from May 1 through June 30, 2014.
• A writer may submit only one entry per category.
• Entry must be the original unpublished work of the writer.
• Winners will be announced at the 2 August 2014 VWC Symposium in Charlottessville, followed by a posting of winners on the VWC website.

Format

• Entries must be in Times New Roman 12 sent as an e-mail attachment. Illustrations will not be accepted or considered.
• Prose must be double-spaced with a ragged right margin; poetry must be single-spaced with a flush left margin.
• No information identifiable to the author should be included in the body of the entry.
• The e-mail message to which the work is attached must include the title of the piece and category, the author's name, address, phone number, and e-mail address. *** An author's biography of no more than 50 words should be included in the e-mail message.

Coordinator: Phyllis "Maggie" Duncan, phyllisduncan52@gmail.com

Please put "Summer Shorts" in the subject line of your email.

AWARDS: $25 - 1^st Place; $15 - 2^nd Place; $10 - 3^rd Place in each category

Entry constitutes permission to publish the winning essay in a future edition of a Virginia Writers Club publication or on the Virginia Writers Club website. Acceptance of the prize money constitutes waiver of any and all further compensation for first publication rights. Remaining rights are the property of the author. Authors retain all rights to non-winning entries.