Jane Belle won the Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize (Under 22) for “The Syrup Boy of Whickering Moor” and LM Bestie took the Senior Prize with “Halfway Through The In-Between”.

Congratulations to Jane Belle, LM Bestie and all our shortlisted authors, whose stories appear in our 2025 anthology “The Middle Ground”.

Buy The Middle Ground from Amazon.

Buy The Middle Ground as a Kindle download from Amazon.

Start thinking now for our 2026 competition theme of “The Cheat”. the 2026 competition will open for entries via our website in late January 2026.

The 2025 Award ceremony, including readings from many of our shortlisted authors, is available on our Facebook page.

Shortlist for Junior Competition, The Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize

Shortlist for the Senior Competition, The Grand Prize

The post 2025 HG Wells Short Story Competition Winners and Awards appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

• 2023 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize Winner: Gloria Mesa for Rain Dance
• 2023 Senior Prize Winner: Keltie Zubko for The Last Teardown of Eleanor

The 2023 Anthology of “Motion” is available now on Amazon at:

• Buy “Motion” on Amazon (UK)
•  Buy “Motion” on Amazon (US)
• Elsewhere search on Amazon for “Motion Joyce”

We’re also delighted to announce the theme of the 2024 competition: The Fool. Make of it what you will!

The Award Ceremony was broadcast on our Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/HGWellsShortStoryCompetition “live” and will be available to watch back until the end of 2023. The ceremony started with a presentation by Dr Paul March-Russell on Men Like Gods.

2022 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize

• Radiyah Nouman reading from Away the Water Drains
• Yuen Tong Law reading from Cast Out of Heaven [reading live]
• Kantaphat Pinaree reading from Elegy for A Machine [reading live]
• Catherine Saunders reading from Figurehead
• Pritha Halder reading from Ladies’ Compartment [reading live]
• Thalia Peterson reading from Pareidolia
• Gloria Mesa reading from Rain Dance by Leyelle [reading live]
• Charlotte Moran reading from The Death of the Ticket Collector [reading live]
• Sarah-Kate Simons reading from The Matchmaker [reading live]
• Allison VanHuysen reading from The Resonance of the Zucchini [reading live]
• Tessa Shutter reading from When a car dies on a deserted road does it make a sound

2023 Senior Prize

• Kerry Ryan reading from A Parcel of Rogues [reading live]
• Steven Jackson reading from A Static Hero [reading live]
• Arthur Neong reading from A Walk in the Park [reading live]
• Jarick Weldon reading from Currents from Cabo Verde
• Katie Rizzo reading from Endless Horizon
• Mary Onions reading from Grounded [reading live]
• Mary Onions reading from Pilgrimage [reading live]
• Keltie Zubko reading from The Last Teardown of Eleanor
• Anna Linstrum reading from Untethered [Unable to read live]
• Ashia Mirza reading from Yahya’s Garden [reading live]

The post 2023 HG Wells Short Story Competition Winners and Awards appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

• 2022 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize Winner: Amelie Roscoe for Salting the Earth

• 2022 Senior Prize Winner: Stephen O’Reilly for Hibernicus Rising

The 2022 Anthology of Switch is available now on Amazon at:

• https://www.amazon.co.uk/Switch-Liz-Joyce/dp/0995573093/  (UK)

• https://www.amazon.com/Switch-Liz-Joyce/dp/0995573093/  (US)

• Elsewhere search on Amazon for “Switch Joyce”

We’re also delighted to announce the theme of the 2022 competition: Switch. Make of it what you will!

The Award Ceremony was broadcast on our Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/HGWellsShortStoryCompetition “live” and will be available to watch back until the end of 2022. The ceremony started with presentations by two speakers:

• Tony Quarrington on Sandgate as home to HG Wells [Video]

• Lord Boeteng on the Importance of Books [Video]

2022 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize

• Ginny Martin reading from Binding Switch

• Katie Farrell reading from Discernment

• Winner: Amelie Roscoe reading from Salting the Earth

• Adriana Tihan reading from Switch

• Ryan Lee reading from The Animal Boy

2022 Senior Prize

• Jamie Littlewood reading from (The Tale Of) Mr Motivator [Video]

• Sasha Gill reading from And Then Come the Pixies [Unable to attend]

• David McVey reading from Ben Kingsley Time-warped My Tennis Ball [Reading Live]

• Winner: Stephen O’Reilly reading from Hibernicus Rising [Reading Live]

• Kim A. Bigelow reading from My Refrigerator Won’t Let Me [Reading Live]

• Susannah Rickards reading from Olive Branches [Video]

• Amanda D’Errico reading from The Rehzinin [Video]

• Adrian Paul reading from What Would the Jackmans Do [Reading Live]

The post 2022 HG Wells Short Story Competition Winners and Awards appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

• 2021 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize Winner: Sarah-Kate Simons for Swamp Thing

• 2021 Senior Prize Winner: Peter Collins for The Domino Effect

We had our biggest entry ever this year for both competitions. Congratulations to all our shortlisted authors, and especially our winners Sarah-Kate and Peter!

The 2021 Anthology of Mask will be available soon: https://hgwellscompetition.com/h-g-wells-competition-short-story-anthologies/

We’re also delighted to announce the theme of the 2022 competition: Switch. Make of it what you will!

The Award Ceremony was broadcast on our Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/HGWellsShortStoryCompetition “live” and will be available to watch back until the end of 2021.

Introduction

Tony Quarrington on Sandgate as home to HG Wells [Video]

2021 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize

Jessica Brien reading from Soup for Starters [Reading Live]

Clara Chiu reading from Masquerade [Video]

Sophia Felsinger reading from Bitter Plums [Video]

Sarah Holm reading from The Shopkeeper [Reading live]

Mia Ramage reading from The Collector’s Shop [Video]

Sumedha Sengupta reading from The Suitor [Reading live]

Winner: Sarah-Kate Simons reading from Swamp Thing [Reading Live]

Nathan Steward reading from Mask [Video] 

Weiyen Tan reading from Fear of the Mask [Reading Live]

2021 Senior Prize

Houssam Alissa: The Trojan Horse [Video]

Fija Callaghan: An Ephemeral Quality [Not reading]

Winner: Peter Collins: The Domino Effect [Not reading]

Simha Haddad reading from Fun and Games [Video]

Katherine Haynes reading from Dreams of Impossible Cowslips [Reading Live]

E. S. Heffernan reading from We, the Dead [Video]

Tony Hunter-Craig reading from Masks of Respectability [Video]

Bethany Ridley-Duff reading from The Other Face [Reading Live]

Lee Stoddart: Ham, Egg and Chips [Not reading]

Sarah Townend reading from The Beauty Parlour [Video]

Dan Vanvick reading from The Enemy Next Door [Video]

Stephen Webb reading from Area 37 [Video]

The post 2021 HG Wells Short Story Competition Award Winners and Ceremony appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

We are going to livestream the event to our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/HGWellsShortStoryCompetition

In addition to the presentation by, and live Q&A with, Sarah Anthony there will be also be readings from our shortlisted stories by their authors

All shortlisted authors will receive a copy of this years anthology “Flight” featuring theirstory and ALL shortlisted stories this year. The anthology is also available to purchase.

Our running order for readings will be:

2020 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize

• Priyadarshini Barua: Murder of Elm [Reading live]
• Hannah Jennison: Can You See Me Now? [Reading live]
• Tesni Penney: A Monochrome World [Reading live]
• Tabitha Rubens: The Invisible Zoo [Video]
• Dewi Schmidt: The Boy Who Could See [Video]
• Matilda Stepek: The Body’s Mistakes [Video]
• Lucy Thynne: Hockney Green [Reading live]

2020 Grand Senior Prize

• Gemma Al-Khayat: The Inconceivable [Reading live]
• Elou Carroll: The Great Green Forever [Video pledged]
• Ian Critchley: Hillman’s Imp [Reading live]
• Matthew Dickens: Afterimages [Reading live]
• Alwin George V: Sitaram—The Footreader [Video]
• Rhiannon Lewis: The Last Flight of La Librairie d’Afrique du Nord [Video]
• Susannah Rickards: Curiosities of the Eye [Video]
• Paul Sherman: Rocket Shed to Heaven [Video]
• Francine van den Berg: God is a Butterfly [Reading live]
• Ali Wilding: The Gift of Sight [Video pledged]

The running order will be Sarah Anthony’s presentation and Q&A, readings from our authors, and then the announcement of the winner of the 2020 Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize and 2020 Grand Senior Prize. We expect to be finished between 1.30 – 2pm.

The post The HG Wells Short Story Competition Awards Ceremony 2020 appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

During my degree, I explored careers in publishing through a series of placements and internships across the industry.

After a brief stint at the Publishers Association working across their campaigns and other Communications and Marketing functions, I joined Curtis Brown’s Books department, where I assist Cathryn Summerhayes on her incredible and eclectic list of fiction and non-fiction titles. I also sit on mentoring charity Arts Emergency’s Trustee board and am a mentor with Creative Access.

I love compelling, witty and pacy fiction. Stories that comment on the world as we know it, or give a new and refreshing twist to old favourites are guaranteed to pique my interest.

I am also interested in narrative non-fiction from unique perspectives; I want to be taken behind the scenes of a career I’d never considered, or hear about first-hand experience of something we don’t often get to talk about.

The post About Silé Edwards appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

Norah is an agent at Curtis Brown and represents clients across modern classics, British crime and true-life adventures, including a small but brilliant list of new writers.

Norah said:

“I’m absolutely delighted to be the keynote speaker and prize-presenter in November – it will be an honour to support such a great initiative.”

Norah will also be giving a presentation on how to get yourself professionally published, focusing on attracting the attention of an agent – which is bound to be of great interest, particularly to our younger authors and new writers.

In addition to the prize money, the two prize winners will also be offered a coaching and advice session with Norah.

Entries for this year’s competition close at midnight, Monday 8th July – so there’s still time to enter. This year’s theme is peace and can be in any genre. You can find out all about the competition at hgwellscompetition.com and follow us at https://www.facebook.com/HGWellsShortStoryCompetition/

The post Norah Perkins to Present 2019 HG Wells Awards appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

At the annual Awards Ceremony on the afternoon of Sunday 25h November at The Grand on The Leas, Folkestone, the organisers of the HG Wells Short Story Competition were delighted to announce the winners of the 2018 competition.

The Winner of the Junior £1,000 Turnill Prize is Abaan Zaidi for “In the Light of the Crescent Moon”.

The winner of the Senior £250 Grand Prize is Wendy Riley for “Yue’s Story”.

Thank you to each and every person that entered the 2018 competitions, and congratulations to our winners and all our shortlisted authors.

This years competition had more entries than for many years, and to pick just two winners was a harder job than ever.

An anthology of the 2018 shortlisted stories will be available to purchase shortly via the HG Wells Short Story Competition website, and we will also publish the two winning stories on the site.

The post 2018 HG Wells Short Story Competition Winners appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

at The Grand, The Leas, Folkestone

Master of Ceremonies: Charles Bain Smith (Chair of Judges)

12.00 Arrival and welcome to Awards Ceremony in the Drawing Room

Welcome drink / tea or coffee

1230 Opening remarks by Charles Bain Smith

Talk by Norah Perkins of Curtis Brown

13.00 Buffet lunch

Dessert and coffee
– Accompanied with video readings from authors unable to attend

14.00 Readings from shortlisted stories

14.30 The Awards

The Grand Prize (senior prize), courtesy of Michael Stainer – awarded by Norah Perkins

The Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize (junior prize), courtesy of Margaret and Reg Turnill – awarded by Norah Perkins

Certificates & Anthologies for shortlisted runners up
– awarded by Charlie Bain Smith

Photographs

14.50  Announcement of next year’s theme and dates

15.00 Close

We should be grateful if, before leaving, you would fill out our feedback form and pass it to any committee member. This helps us improve future competitions and events.

Thank you.

The post 2018 Awards Ceremony Programme appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.

• Hazel Atkinson’s ”Venus Rising”  is the Margaret and Reg Turnill Prize Winner (£1000);
• Alex Reece Abbott’s “When the Call Comes” is the Grand Prize Winner (£250);
• Robin Jones’ “Alone into the Alone” is the Judges’ Special Commendation prize (£100).

As in past years, a full anthology of all short-listed entries will be available soon.

Congratulations to all our winners.

2017 winning stories

The post 2017 H G Wells Competition Winners: The Stories appeared first on The HG Wells Short Story Competition.