Here’s some incentive to write more next year: the largest prize I’ve found so far is $100,000 for a novel, plus publication! If you haven’t written a novel yet, you can still win anywhere from $1,200 to $3,500 for your stories, poems, and essays. So, what are you waiting for? Start submitting!
- The 76th Annual Writer’s Digest Writing Competition
- Top Prize: $3,000 and a trip to New York City to meet with agents and editors.
- Genre: Ten categories, everything from inspirational writing to movie scripts.
- Entry fee: $10 for first poem ($5 for additional poems), $15 for first entry for everything else ($10 for additional entries).
- Deadline: May 15th, 2007 (or by June 1st, 2007 with an additional $2 fee).
- The Sobol Award
- Top Prize: $100,000 and publication by Simon & Schuster.
- Genre: Any novel (between 50,000 and 300,000 words) written by an unpublished writer without a literary agent.
- Entry fee: $85 per manuscript.
- Deadline: March 31, 2007 (or earlier, if the maximum number of submissions is received).
- Note: US residents only.
- Fog City Writers Short Story & Poetry Contest
- Top Prize: $3,500 for best short story, $1,000 for best poem.
- Genre: Any short story no longer than 5,000 words and any poem no longer than 100 lines.
- Entry fee: $20 for one short story, $30 for two, and $35 for three. $12.50 for each poem.
- Deadline: December 31st, 2006 for the current contest and January 1st, 2007 for the next contest.
- PRISM international has two contests: the Fiction Contest and the Literary Nonfiction Contest
- Top Prize: $2,000 for best story and $1,500 for best work of literary nonfiction.
- Genre: Any work of fiction or literary nonfiction no longer than 25 pages.
- Entry fee: $27 for one entry and $7 for each additional entry.
- Deadline: Fiction contest: January 31st, 2007. Literary nonfiction contest: September 30th, 2007.
- The New Letters Awards for Writers
- Top Prize: $1,500 for best essay, $1,500 for best short story, and $1500 for best group of poems.
- Genre: Any essay, short story, or group of three to six poems. Each entry must be no longer than 8,000 words.
- Entry fee: $15 for first entry, $10 for each additional entry.
- Deadline: May 18th, 2007.
- The Fish One-Page Short Story Prize and The 2nd Fish International Poetry Prize
- Top Prize: €1,000 and publication in the 2007 Fish Anthology.
- Genre: Any short story (flash fiction) no longer than 300 words, and any poem (no restriction on length).
- Entry fee: €12 per entry.
- Deadline: March 31st, 2007. (Submissions open on January 1st, 2007.)
- The Tom Howard/John H. Reid Short Story Contest and Poetry Contest
- Top Prize: $1,200 for best short story and $1,000 for best poem.
- Genre: Any work of prose (short stories, essays, whatever) no longer than 5,000 words, and any poem.
- Entry fee: $12 per entry for prose and $6 for every 25 lines of poetry.
- Deadline: March 31st, 2007 for prose and September 30th, 2007 for poetry.
I hope those prizes got your attention! 
If you know of any more great writing contests, share them in the comments.
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Thanks for the information–never realized there were so many writing contests out there. Do you know how many writers participate?
Hey Liz!
Dude! Glad you put these together, but ya coulda told me sooner. lol. Kinda like the problogger submissions, except that wasn’t really your fault, that was a quick deadline.
Now to only convince my wife to let me get my own domain, and to let me pay entry fees for all the contests….
haha.
I agree with Brad, I had no idea this many existed. Are these more profitable then magazine articles?
http://joshmaher.wordpress.com/2006/12/18/2007-prediction-blogs-will-be-replaced/
Great list! Thanks for the info
you really ARE a writing nerd to keep up on so many varieties of contests. congrats! i like your blog. i found it over at the problogger that i’m also participating in over here.
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This list is worth printing out and saving — thank you for putting this together!
From one writer to another — good luck!
Wow, some amazing prizes indeed!! We also participated in this project, stop on by if you get a chance!
WOw you really diiged for those info.Thx for sharing it.
I also got entry in darrens project.
http://technospot.net/blogs/index.php/2006/12/19/predicting-the-evolution-of-techspot-insideout/
And i am feeding your blog.There wont be another chance to meet so many bloggers
Followed your link from problogger.com.
Great list! Thanks.
Great list, thanks.
(Just FYI, though, I’ve heard a lot of negative things regarding the Sobol since it was announced a few months ago.)
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Thanks for the comments, guys!
Brad — I haven’t seen any numbers published, but I know some of these (like the Writer’s Digest contests) must get tons of submissions!
Nancy — What have you heard about it? I never heard of the Sobol Award until just a couple days ago. But $100,000 is the largest prize for a writing contest I’ve ever seen, so I just had to include it!
Some of these are really great!
Thanks for the info!
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Here are some links about the Sobol:
“Sobol Award Sparks Debate” from Publishers Weekly:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6372748.html
And from the blogosphere:
http://www.gawker.com/news/books/literary-contest-winners-to-get-published-screwed-219869.php
http://misssnark.blogspot.com/2006/07/sobol-award-give-me-break.html
I’ve also seen a lot of discussion about the Sobol on writing message boards and such. I’m not sure if the contest is necessarily good or bad, personally–I just know that it’s causing a lot of controversy…
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Interesting. Thanks for those links, Nancy!
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Good list, Liz. I need to work on my fiction writing again in 2007.
I didn’t realize you were into fiction writing. Feel free to email me if you ever want to talk about it. See ya.
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I think this is a great thing to post on the NNEM site — maybe add a recommendation to the wiki?
Oh yeah, hadn’t even thought of that! Maybe I will.
If you would like to polish your skills, check out: http://www.wildacres.com
And take a look at http://www.ncstoryfest.org if you would like a chance to win $1000 (no writing required
)
Hello! Good Site! Thanks you! cgprjguwsorswt
last time, i joined a writing contests on the internet and i won a small price for writing a nice piece of writing “;`