Something or Other Publishing (SOOP) has announced its annual short story no-fee contest.
Designed to honour excellence in writing short stories and flash fiction, especially for emerging authors, a statement on the publisher’s website said all valid entries are reviewed by SOOP’s team of Curators who award a “Curator’s Choice” cash prize from each heat of 25 qualified entries.
“The top three entries from each heat move forward to the Semi-finals, to be judged by an independent panel of judges, for consideration for additional awards and cash prizes to the authors,” the statement adds.
What is more? Authors retain all rights to their submission throughout the contest. Submissions for flash fiction, short story and short non-fiction are accepted on an ongoing basis, across the 25 diverse literary categories listed on the website.
How it works is: “Your stories will not be published in our site – only your name, title, and the synopsis you provide. Authors must then qualify each submission by getting votes for it from the Author’s potential fans. A vote is simply a reader’s name and email, indicating interest in the synopsis you provide. Other than reaching the qualified number of votes, no consideration is given for the number of votes. Winners are chosen solely based on which stories score highest with our panel of independent judges”.
SOOP said its purpose in conducting this contest is to provide a steady flow of stories for SOOP’s curators, who recommend stories to its editorial team, to review “so that we can then offer a unique publishing opportunity for these emerging authors. Anyone who is offered, and accepts a contract will have their submission published in one or more carefully curated anthologies, similar to a 25 Servings of SOOP Volume I, with royalties that are generally above industry standards”.
To enter, please complete the submissions form at SOOP’s website and be sure to select the correct category from the drop down menu. You may enter separate submissions to as many categories as you would like as well as multiple separate submissions within a category. Please note that the requirements for each entry must be met for the entry to be valid.
You will receive an email with a voting page link. Per the email, please send it out to your family members, friends, and fans and ask for votes. Each vote requires only the person’s name and email address, submitted in support of your work.
Your submission must receive the required number of votes (25 for contest ending 2021 / 50 for contest ending in 2022) in order for you to be eligible for prizes and/or a publishing contract offer.