This exciting short story competition is part of Virago’s 50th birthday celebrations – and the chance to be published in an anthology alongside bestselling, award-winning writers including Margaret Atwood and Kamila Shamsie.
Hachette UK’s The Future Bookshelf is running the Virago 50th Furies Short Story Competition to help discover unpublished women writers or writers of an underrepresented gender from Black, Asian, mixed heritage and multi-ethnic groups; the LGBTQIA+ community; neurodiverse individuals; people with disabilities; and/or individuals from working class backgrounds.
This competition will be organised by Virago Press, and we are looking for a short story of any genre.
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WHAT IS THE PRIZE?
This year, we celebrate Virago’s 50th Anniversary with the publication of Furies, a short story collection from today’s most exciting and bestselling authors who have each written a story around a different synonym of Virago. We have Margaret Atwood’s ‘Siren’, Ali Smith’s ‘Spitfire’, Claire Kohda’s ‘Tygress’ and so on.
This competition is for an original short story which fulfils the same brief we set our Furies writers: to write an original, feminist short story inspired by a synonym for ‘virago’.
The winner of the Virago 50th Furies Short Story Competition will be published alongside the Furies authors in the paperback and ebook editions, as well as receive a cash prize and an hour-long mentoring session with a Virago editor.
Judges include acclaimed writers (Monica Ali, Claire Kohda and Kirsty Logan), two members of the Virago editorial team, and a literary agent (Laura Macdougall from United Agents).
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KEY DATES
28th April 2023 – Submissions open
1st July 2023 – Submissions close
15th September 2023 – Shortlist notified
1st October 2023 – Winner announced
Please contact viragofuries@littlebrown.co.uk for any queries.
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HOW TO ENTER
Use the form below to enter your writing submission as a PDF or as a Word document.
Submissions will open on 28th April 2023.
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CRITERIA FOR ENTRY
This Competition is open to people of underrepresented genders and women who are from Black, Asian, Mixed Heritage, and multiple-ethnic groups; part of the LGBTQIA+ community; neurodiverse; have a disability; self-identify as working-class individuals; or are from a working-class background. Entrants must be aged 18 or over, resident in the United Kingdom and must not have an agent at the time of entering the Competition or have had any book or short story previously published by a publisher or self-published in whole or in part in any format or be under a contract to have their work published in any form or format. The Competition is not open to employees of the Publisher or United Agents Limited, their families, or to anyone professionally connected to the Competition or connected to the judges either themselves or through their families.
The judging criteria is as follows:
- A creative short story of any fiction genre which is inspired by a synonym for ‘virago’, a word which originally meant a heroic, war-like woman but came to be a derogatory term.
- The story must have a strong, feminist hook, theme or plot and must be written in an accessible writing style which the general reader will understand.
- The synonym should be unused by a previous FURIES contributor. The words siren, virago, churail, termagant, wench, hussy, vituperator, harridan, warrior, she-devil, muckraker, spitfire, fury, tygress and dragon are all unavailable. Available words include biddy, bitch, fire-eater, harpy, scold and vixen – but we welcome your own ideas!
Other entry requirements are that the entry must:
- Be a maximum of 4,000 words of text
- Be in English
Entries must be submitted by midnight on 1st July 2023.
Full terms and conditions are available here.
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PRIZES
The winner will receive £1,500 prize money and the opportunity to be published in the Furies paperback and ebook editions, plus,
- An hour-long mentoring session with a Virago editor;
- Four copies of the Furies paperback
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THE JUDGES
- Monica Ali, Virago author
- Claire Kohda, Virago author
- Kirsty Logan, Virago author
- Laura Macdougall, literary agent at United Agents
- Sarah Savitt, Virago Publisher
- Alexa Allen-Batifoulier, Virago Assistant Editor
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ABOUT VIRAGO
A feminist publisher of outstanding books for all readers
Virago was founded by Carmen Callil in 1973 as a feminist publishing company. Inspired by the political and social change of that decade, the women who created Virago believed passionately that writing by women should be celebrated, enjoyed, taken seriously and read widely. Writers and readers immediately embraced the list: women wanted a voice, to understand their history, to be championed and to see themselves on the page. Decades later, we at Virago still believe that books can change the world.
The name Virago (meaning heroic war-like woman or, as the Thesaurus has it a name for a particular kind of woman: biddy, bitch, dragon, fire-eater, fury, harpy, harridan, hussy, muckraker, scold, she-devil, siren, spitfire, termagant, tigress, vituperator, vixen, wench) signalled the founders’ intent to challenge, entertain, enrich, raise eyebrows and revolutionise the literary landscape.
We have always been committed to amplifying the widest range of women writers and elevating voices from all backgrounds. More recently, as part of our commitment to an ever more inclusive feminism, we also publish and welcome submissions from writers of underrepresented genders. Our publishing has always had enormous range, from literary fiction, humour and poetry, to polemic, history and memoir, and beyond. And we embrace new ways of reaching different readers, whether that’s launching the Ourshelves podcast, starting a graphic novel list or publishing children’s classics. Taken together, this breadth and variety says: our authors can write about anything – and should be read and enjoyed by everyone.
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FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
What does unpublished mean?
For this competition, unpublished means you have never had had any book previously published by a publisher or self-published in any format (and are not under contract to have your work published).
Am I eligible?
This Competition is open to people of underrepresented genders and women who are from Black, Asian, Mixed Heritage, and multiple-ethnic groups; part of the LGBTQIA+ community; neurodiverse; have a disability; self-identify as working-class individuals; or are from a working-class background. Entrants must be aged 18 or over, resident in the United Kingdom and must not have an agent at the time of entering the Competition or have had any book or short story previously published by a publisher or self-published in whole or in part in any format or be under a contract to have their work published in any form or format. The Competition is not open to employees of the Publisher or United Agents Limited, their families, or to anyone professionally connected to the Competition or connected to the judges either themselves or through their families.
