Short Story Competition
Got a potential page-turner inside you? Then polish up your prose and send your entry to this year’s Short Story Competition. First prize is £750, while second and third-place winners will receive £300 and £200 respectively.
There is also a special prize of £100 in the category for best local author.
Competitions open on 1 April and close on 30 June.
Short Story Judge 2026
Carole Burns
Carole Burns is an American writer living in Cardiff. Her story collection The Missing Woman won the John C. Zacharis Award from U.S. literary journal Ploughshares. Her recent novel The Same Country, exploring family, friendship and racism in America, was named a best Welsh fiction book of 2023 by Wales Arts Review.
A freelancer for Washington Post and LitHub, she also published Off the Page: Writers Talk About Beginnings, Endings, and Everything in Between, based on interviews with 43 writers including Jhumpa Lahiri and Colm Tóibín.
She is Associate Professor in English teaching Creative Writing at the University of Southampton.
Competitions open 1 April 2026
Competitions open 1 April and close on 30 June 2026.
Prize Giving and Poetry Reading will take place on Monday 19 October starting at 2pm as part of the Festival.
Please read the rules and terms and conditions before submitting your entry.