Short Story Competition Results
2025

Here are the judge's choices for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place…
Winner:

“Seahorse Daddy”
(tender, heartwarming, flashes of real loveliness)

By Sarah Clowes
2nd Place:

“Potemkin Station” (Strong voice, compelling storytelling)

By Rebecca Tinsley
3rd Place(Joint)

“One Rat, Three Mice and a Pumpkin”

By Denarii Peters

and
My Father the Contortionist

By Matt Thomas
Also Short-Listed:

Dorothy Mariko McCarthy
Matt Hawkins
Long Listed Authors:

  • Alex Clissold-Jones
  • Alice Niall
  • Anders Ross
  • Ashish Ipe
  • Christian Stevens
  • Claire Davies
  • Claire Moffett
  • David Missen
  • David Oakley
  • Diane Bown Wilson (2 stories)
  • Dorothy Mariko McCarthy
  • Gary Finnegan
  • Ian Plenderleith
  • Judith Thomson
  • Juliet Hill
  • Kate Blackadder
  • Mark Newman
  • Melissa Mitcheson
  • Nargis Lal (2 stories)
  • Nigel Hall
  • Penny-Anne Beaudoin
  • Sara Green
  • T.E. Lowe
  • Willy Adam

Congratulations to all our winners!

We thank you all for entering. If your entry did reach the long and short lists this year, please take courage from the fact that competition was fierce, and that so many wonderful stories missed by a single (or even a fraction of a) point.
Read the winning story here
A big thankyou to our judge Corinne LaBalme
Our judge for this Competition, Paris Based Novelist, Travel and Food writer Corinne LaBalme, has published 4 novels, Temporary Engagement, Summer People, French Ghost and French Toast. Her next book, French Post, will be released in 2026.