Last Revised 04-28-13

 The Alaska Writers Guild is pleased to announce six writing contests for AWG members this calendar year.  The awards, described below, will be announced and presented at the monthly meeting following the competition deadline.

Additions or changes since the last revision date are shown in red, and are back-lighted in light gray

 Winners Stories   (click here to view past winning stories, 1st, 2nd and 3rd places)

 Filenames and content  (click here for file layouts and examples)

Awards will be given to the top three stories/poems

  First Place:       $50 and a certificate, sponsored by Evan Swensen, Publication Consultants
  Second Place:  $35 and a certificate, sponsored by Barry Dearborn
  Third Place:     $20 and a certificate, sponsored by Nan and Cam Potts

Contest Genres

(Entries must be received by midnight on the fifth of the month specified below)
  Fiction               February                             August
  Non-fiction       April                                   October
  Poetry               June (blank verse)               December (rhyme)

Contest Rules

   1. Email both entry files, as attachments, to bcdearb@gmail.com

       Biographical or other information not requested will not be read or retained
   2. Please put "BI-MONTHLY WRITING CONTEST FOR MEMBERS" in the subject line.
   3. Entries must include a cover sheet containing the author's name, email
       address, genre, date of contest deadline and word count. This must be submitted as an attached file (PDF preferred, MsWord okay)

       For more information, click on the link to Filenames and Content (above)
   4. Entries containing any reference (or hint) to the author's identity within the submitted  story will be disqualified.
   5.  Obscene, offensive, defamatory, or libelous entries will be disqualified.
   6. Text must be double-spaced, Times Roman type face, at font size 12 with
       standard one inch margins.
   7. Do not include art, any picture inserts or attach any other embellishment files,
       unless the contest specifically allows such.
   8. Only one entry per member per bi-monthly contest period.
   9. Prose entries must be no longer than 2,500 words (not including the title). Include the word count on the upper right corner of the first page. Include page numbers at the bottom of each page of the submission.

       For more information, click on the link to Filenames and Content (above)
 10. Poetry entries may be required to be composed about a topic provided in the
       announcement. Currently, there is no word limit.

       The form will either be blank verse or rhyme. (see contest genres by month)

 11. Entries must be entirely the work of the entrant and must never have been
       published or have won a prize in any other competition.
 12. Late entries and those not meeting the above criteria will be disqualified.

 Again, please submit both cover sheet and story files as PDF email attachments, however, MsWord files will be accepted).

Judging

   Judges will not see the cover sheet, or otherwise learn of the author’s identity.

   Each judge will return, to the coordinator, their ranking for the submitted entries.  The coordinator converts the judges ranking position to points under a fixed formula.  Ties at any of the ranking positions are allowed from the judges.  Most of the time, the varying scoring of the four judges will resolve ties at the top three rankings.

   For poetry, the above will be applied but evaluation is largely subjective.

Recognition

   Besides the awards being presented during the AWG general meeting, the authors of each of the wining entries will have the opportunity to talk about and/or read an excerpt from their story, within a maximum of three minutes.  If the author is absent but has prepared a page to be read, the coordinator or a volunteer will do the reading.
 

All submissions receiving certificates will be published in PDF format in the web page Winners Stories (see link above)