The 2015 Literary Contest Rules are Here!

Submissions start TODAY

During our first lit contest, we gathered an amazing collection of stories from six different countries and decided upon three great winners in “No Name,” “Mona,” and our grand prize winner, “From Her Tears Came the Sky.” Now that we’re up and running again, we want to hold our next writing contest and try a different theme. Who’s the next person to gain entrance into our Winners’ Circle? Is it you?

So first, let’s talk about the rules:

ELIGIBILITY

1. There is a nonrefundable, five dollar entry fee (fees help pay for the prize money). The money can be sent to us at “fundraising@legendarywomen.org.” When you submit your story via email, just make a note of your PayPal name so we can cross check between the stories received and the funds received at the PayPal account. That way, we’ll be sure you’ve covered your entrance fee.
2. Writers of all gender identities are eligible and encouraged to submit, as long as contest entries adhere to the criteria outlined below.
3. Board members of Legendary Women, Inc., as well as their close friends and family, are not eligible to enter this contest. Similarly, the family and close friends of members of the judging committee are not eligible to enter.
4. All entries must be received by us no later than 11:59 PM, Pacific Standard Time (US) on March 31, 2015. Any emails with a time stamp after this will NOT be opened or accepted.
5. Authors must be 16+ years of age. One day, we’ll host something for younger writers, but this is not that contest.
6. Stories that have been submitted elsewhere will be accepted. However, we will not accept stories that are have been published elsewhere.
7. Finally, we do love fanfiction. We think it is an awesome form of expression. With that being said, there are legal complications that arise from giving prize money to work that uses someone else’s original characters and intellectual property. At this time, we are unable to accept fanfiction or anything previously written as fanfiction for this contest. (This includes any works that began as fanfiction, but were re-purposed as short stories with names and details changed. We can tell.) Similarly, obvious pulled to publish fanfic or fanfic with “the serial numbers filed off” are not allowed.

RULES

1. Stories must have a woman protagonist. To be clear, we are inclusive of all people who identify themselves as women.We do not discriminate. In fact, we encourage women protagonists who are not just cisgender as well as those from different racial, religious, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds and with different sexual orientations.
2. Again, all content must be original. Work that is either fanfiction or that is discovered as plagiarized will not be eligible. Additionally, if an individual submits plagiarized work to us and we find out, they will be banned from entering LW writing contests in perpetuity.
3. We are sex positive. One day, we may have differently themed contests including categories like erotica. However, this is not an erotica contest. While stories may discuss sex frankly and openly as it relates to plot and character, stories featuring graphic sexual content, anything beyond an R-rating, will not be considered.
4. We will not accept stories that glamorize or glorify prejudice and bigotry. Yes, we do understand if the antagonists/villains in the story are bigoted and the story concerns the heroine overcoming that. However, anything that we view as sympathetic to discrimination will be disqualified. Also, there are a few curse words that, if used in your story, will automatically disqualify you. Use of the f-word, c-word or n-word will automatically disqualify you. Please do not use them. Remember, this goes up on our Medium site for the public to read, so please try to keep curses to a minimum and to avoid slurs. Thank you.
5. Stories MUST BE between 1,000 and 3,000 words. We will not accept any stories either over or under that word limit. If we see that the file you send us is NOT within the word limit, it will not be read and your entry will be automatically disqualified. Also, these must be complete stories. We do not accept stories that are actually parts of book chapters. These must stand alone short stories.
6. You are allowed one entry per author. This means per your legal name. You cannot submit multiple entries under different pen names. HOWEVER, you may write with a writing partner. If one piece is listed as being written by two people, that’s okay. Still, the same rules apply and only one entry per team or person is allowed. Also, if you enter as a team and place within the Top 3, you will split the prize money. It will not be doubled.
7. All stories must be sent in with the nonrefundable, $5.00 U.S. entry fee. Those that are not will be disqualified. Similarly, if your story is disqualified due to length, formatting, or subject matter, your entry fee will be forfeited. Please work hard to make sure your stories are eligible!
8. Legendary Women, Inc. reserves the right to display and promote the winning stories on our site for no less than six months after they are posted. Afterwards, we can take them down, if asked, so that the winners can submit them to other places for formal publication.
9. Currently, all stories must be in English. Our staff consists mainly of English readers, so stories in other languages cannot be accepted.

FORMATTING

1. Stick to standard fonts. We will accept stories typed in Times New Roman, Calibri, or Arial ONLY.
2. All stories must be submitted in BLACK type face. Special colors or color coded stories will not be accepted.
3. The stories submitted must be double spaced.
4. Please put the page numbers on top of your pages. DO NOT put your name on the top of the pages, only the numbers.
5. The files must be sent as .rtf files. We have a variety of computers and entries must be sent in rich text format. If an entry is submitted in ANY OTHER FORMAT, the story will be disqualified.

CONTEST THEME

Last time, we wanted stories that featured strong women protagonists, in whichever manner someone chose to define that. This time, we want to receive stories that pass the Bechdel Test. For the purposes of this contest, we boil it down to this:

A. Two women must share a scene or a dialogue together

B. There must be no men present during this conversation

C. The two women must talk during this conversation about things other than men (lovers, sons, husbands….etc.)

That’s our line for this. Some versions of Bechdel are more complicated than others, but that’s what we’re looking for. Some words of wisdom: If you create a scene/dialogue that only passes the Bechdel Test on a technicality, your entry may still qualify for judging. However, it may not be judged as highly as a scene/dialogue of decent length, depth, and quality.

You can always consult the Twitter and website of our friends at The Bitch Pack, who have done excellent analyses of movies that pass Bechdel, as well as our previous recaps of Game of Thrones or American Horror Story that point out examples of if/how episodes pass Bechdel. Also, in addition to the link to the Wikipedia Bechdel page above, you can Google many examples and discussions as well.

PRIZES AND DATES FOR ENTRANTS

So first up, when do you submit?

The ability to start submitting to our email will begin on January 31, 2015 and it will remain open for two months until March 31st, 2015, 11:59 pm Pacific Standard Time in the United States.

Here is how you enter:

1. Go to our PayPal at “fundraising@legendarywomen.org” and pay the five dollar entry fee.
2. Send us a short email to contests@legendarywomen.org with your name, the country from which you are sending the story, the word count of the story, and the email name/account you used to send the five dollar entry fee to our fundraising@legendarywomen.org PayPal so we can verify that you’ve paid the entrance fee.
3. Make sure that your story is complete with numbered pages and attached as a .RTF file to the email.

The email for submitting stories is different from the previous year. Now, we have an email that is specifically for contests. Again, this year please email your submission with the attached story file to:

contests@legendarywomen.org

So what can I win?

Third place

You will win $25.00 USD have your story published on our site, and also have a short paragraph written up about you and featured on our site.

Second place

You will win $50.00 USD, have your story published on our site, and have a short interview with you featured on our site.

First place

You will win $125.00 USD, have your story published on our site, and have a long form interview featured on our site.

All bragging rights are implied!

Finally, what is the TIME FRAME?

As said above, we will take entries from January 31st to March 31st. We will start organizing the stories for first round reviews during the first week of April. We hope to have the first round of reading done and stories narrowed down by May 1st. During the month of May, we will conduct our second round of reviews and further narrow the works down to the top five finalists. At that point, all authors will be contacted and informed as to whether or not they have passed on to the final judging round.

Then, those finalists will be sent to a panel of yet-to-be-chosen judges, which will consist of a mix of published writers, feminist scholars, and activists. This panel will be the one to make the final decisions on winners. From there, we hope to have a consensus on our winners by the beginning of July.

At that point, the winners will be notified, given their prize money, and we will start posting the winning stories and interviews towards the end of July 2015.

If we are inundated with more stories than we expect, we reserve the right to take longer with judgment. This is a general estimated timeline, but it may change, depending on circumstances.

If you have any other questions, please send them to either mbates@legendarywomen.org or to aprilmwalsh@legendarywomen.org and our Board can clarify your concerns. We look forward to all your creativity!