The London Magazine Short Story Prize 2024

 

The London Magazine has published short stories by some of the most well-respected literary figures over the course of its long history, from Jean Rhys and Raymond Carver, to Virginia Woolf and V.S. Pritchett. Our annual Short Story Competition seeks out new voices to join them.

Established to encourage emerging literary talent, the award provides an opportunity for publication and recognition, rewarding imagination, originality and creativity. The London Magazine is taking submissions for previously unpublished short stories that do not exceed the maximum of 2,500 words, from writers across the world.

We are delighted to announce that the stories will be judged by: Benjamin Markovits, Brandon Taylor, and Naomi Wood.

All winning stories will appear in future issues of The London Magazine. Winners will also receive cash prizes (see below), and will be celebrated as part of prize-giving ceremony in the autumn.

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Information

 

Entry fee: £10 per short story

Subsequent entries: £5 per story

Student/Low Income Entry: £5 per story
(Must be submitted with a valid university email address)

Note: There is no limit to the number of entries you can submit.

Opening date: 23rd July 2024
Closing date: 25th September 2024

First Prize: £500
Second Prize: £300
Third Prize: £200

Enter Short Story Prize

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Judges

 

Benjamin Markovits grew up in Texas, London and Berlin. He has written eleven novels and published stories, essays and reviews in The Times Literary Supplement, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Esquire and other publications. In 2013, he was named by Granta to their list of best British novelists under forty. In 2015, his novel, You Don’t Have to Live Like This, won the James Tait Black Prize for fiction. He lives in London and teaches Creative Writing at Royal Holloway.

Benjamin is ‘looking, among other things, for stories with a clear shape, that suggest real life, and don’t rely on exaggerated feelings or effects.’

Image credit: Barney Cokeliss.

Brandon Taylor is the author of the novels The Late Americans and Real Life, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, and named a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice and a Science + Literature Selected Title by the National Book Foundation. His collection Filthy Animals, a national bestseller, was awarded The Story Prize and shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. He is the 2022-2023 Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fellow at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers.

He is ‘looking for stories that capture the connection between the personal and the social. Stories that are specific in time and place. Stories that privilege event and situation over spectacle. I want stories with a sense of humor, but which are also serious. I want stories that dramatize the personal stakes of a life in surprising and exciting ways. I want stories that see in those personal stakes the very issues that shape our time.’

Image credit: Brandon Taylor

Naomi Wood is an award-winning author and an Associate Professor at the University of East Anglia. She is the author of three novels, The Godless Boys, Mrs. Hemingway and The Hiding Game (Picador).

Her debut story collection, This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things, is out now with Orion (UK). Her story ‘Comorbidities’ won the 2023 BBC National Short Story Prize; her other stories have been shortlisted for the Manchester Fiction Prize, the Galley Beggar Press Short Story Prize, and the ALCS/Tom Gallon Society of Authors Prize. She lives in Norwich with her family.

She is looking for ‘a story that feels fresh, that is boldly voiced, and which asks questions about how we live today.’

Image credit: Christa Holka

Header image credit: Antonio Olmos