Competition

The 2019 Summer FlashBack Fiction Microfiction Competition

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Moon Landing, FlashBack Fiction is holding its second Historical Microfiction Competition.

Theme: The Moon

Inspiration: Entrants are not limited to writing about the moon landing. Provided the piece is historical and the moon plays a significant role, we welcome stories on anything from eclipses, explorers, navigators, astronomers, smugglers, sonatas, festivals, harvests, and hunters. Let your historical imagination lift off. Stories can be set anywhere or anytime, as long as it’s before 2000 CE and linked to human history. We are not open to futuristic stories.

Cost: The first entry is FREE; £3 for each subsequent entry.

Deadline: 11:59 pm BST on Sunday 16 June 2019

Word limit: 100 words total, excluding title. Hyphenated words count as one word.

Submission limit: writers can submit one free entry and additional entries at £3 per entry.  An entry consists of one flash, hybrid or prose poem of up to 100 words, excluding title.

Prizes:

£25 for First Place
£15 for Second Place
£10 for Third Place

Publication:

We will feature all three prize-winning stories and selected runners-up at FlashBack Fiction in the week leading up to the anniversary of the Moon Landing, with the winning piece revealed on Friday 19 July.

Multiple Submissions:

Authors may submit one story for free. Additional stories may be submitted for a donation of £3.  Any donations raised in this way will be put toward prize money in a future competition with a free entry option.

Simultaneous Submissions & Previous Publications:

Given the time frame, we can only consider unpublished stories that are not submitted elsewhere for the duration of the contest (i.e. until 19 July 2019).

The small print:

  • To submit your story, please send your piece as a .doc, .docx, .odt, .pdf, or .rtf to flashbackfiction <at> gmail <dot> com.
  • Please do not include your name in the file, or in the file name.
  • Please put the following in the subject line of your email:  COMPETITION – Title of piece.
  • Please put your word count after the title in the document.
  • The first entry is free.  Additional stories are welcome with a donation of £3 per piece.  (If your PayPal name is different from your pen name, please make sure to note this in your e-mail.)
  • Please include a 50-word, third-person bio that can be printed alongside your piece if it is published. (If you like, you can add an additional line with your website and social media contacts that does not count against the 50-word limit).  Include this in the body of your email (and not in the document with your story).
  • We would like to publish some of the runners up in the days leading up to the 20th of July. If you would NOT like your piece published if it doesn’t win a cash prize, please let us know in the cover letter. (This will not affect the judging in any way).
  • Non-UK entrants will need to be able to accept prize money via PayPal.
  • The competition will be judged by the editorial team at FlashBack Fiction.
  • More about submissions and publication can be found on our Submissions page.