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Winning Strategy
How writing competitions can boost your writing career
Notes: This article first appeared in Writing Magazine in October 2015. (*= affiliate link: I sometimes use affiliate links in my posts. This won’t cost you anything, but if you go on to buy from a link I may earn a small commission.)
I shall never forget the day when Richard Bell from Writers’ News magazine telephoned to tell me I’d won their Foggy Morning short story competition. It was back in 1998, and I just wanted to collapse into an exhausted heap on the sofa because I’d had such a foul day at work.
The phone rang as soon as I stepped in through the front door, and I don’t know who I thought might be calling, but I certainly didn’t expect it to be Richard. To be told, ‘Congratulations, your story won,’ was not only immensely gratifying, but also confidence boosting. It was my first piece of published fiction.
It was also the first piece of fiction I was paid for. Winning a writing competition often means pocketing some prize money, which is always gratefully received. After all, as Samuel Johnson so quaintly put it:
‘No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.’
And as far as writing competitions go, the prize pot can vary from £50 for a small…
