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The 1st Playing Bingo Short Story Competition

Get writing!

Keeping up our tradition of celebrating the culture and heritage of bingo in the UK, Playing Bingo is launching its 1st Short Story Competition.

We want to bulk up our Creative Corner, and taking inspiration from our small Stories section of the site, we thought a competition would be a fun way to generate some great new fiction about our favourite game.

There's some great prizes up for grabs as well as the chance to entertain our readers with your finely crafted piece of bingo fiction.

Competition Result

Playing Bingo would like to thank all the entrants to the competition. 174 stories qualified for entry, which was whittled down to a short-list of 15 stories for final judging by the award winning novelist and short story writer Rachel Trezise. The final results are in, and we're pleased to announce the winners.

The Winners

1st place: Graham Curtis - A Secret Delight - £300 winner.
2nd place: Chloe Dalton - The Cuckoo - £100 winner.
Runner up: Arabella Chippindall-Higgin - Game Of Chance - £50 winner.
Runner up: Dominic Delargy - Buzzword Bingo - £50 winner.

Our judge Rachel Trezise had this to say about the entries.

It was incredibly difficult to choose just one winning short story from the selection I was given. All fifteen stories have something to offer in terms of entertainment, writing quality, humour and the power to engage. The top four placed stories have a combination of all four of these things. The two runner-ups, Buzzword Bingo and Game of Chance, set in an office and a dystopian world respectively, seem to catch something of the zeitgeist; bosses full of hyperbole and Hunger Games-style bingo assassinations. In second place, The Cuckoo is a wonderfully crafted piece of fiction that made me feel as though I was myself experiencing an oppressively hot July in 1980’s Hounslow. The winning story, A Secret Delight, I simply love because it’s so warm, fast-paced, and gripping. Plus it manages to cut through the snobbery that exists around bingo without ever appearing callous.

Also Shortlisted

The below stories also made the final judging shortlist, as choosen by our panel of judges here at Playing Bingo.

Sue Oldham - Marking Time.
Sim Smailes - An Evening with David Beckham.
Tim Crump - The Friendly Warning.
Paul Ewart - House Rules.
Lynda Lofthouse - Number Eighty Five.
Tony Oswick - Help!
Robbie Neville - The Jackpot.
Clare Banks - Final Call To Eden.
Gaynor Jones - The Cheque.
Tess Niland Kimber - Girl's Night Out.
Marina Jacobs - The First Time.

And Finally

Over coming months we will be gradually adding all the entries to our Creative Corner Stories section, for you to read. We will also be publishing all the shortlisted entries in a print anthology. Keep an eye out for news on that via our news section.

If you missed out on sending an entry, hang around as we will be repeating this competition in the near future, as well as having some other creative competitions for you and your writing skills.

Competition Entry Details (Now Closed)

Note: Competition now closed, below details left for reference.

Fancy entering? Here's all you need to know. Please read the terms and conditions thoroughly, to ensure your eligibility to enter the competition and win one of the prizes available.

Prizes

We're offering a range of prizes for people taking part as follows:

1st Place - £300
2nd Place - £100
2 x Runner's Up Prizes - £50
All shortlisted entries will be collected and published in an anthology for the shortlisted writers, as well as being featured on this site in the Creative Corner Stories section.

Story Theme

The theme for the fictional short story is "Bingo".

Here's some ideas for potential areas the theme could embrace. It could be about a bingo hall and the staff, the game being played in a social club, charity bingo games, bingo games in school, bingo online, a bingo site chat room or whatever, the only stricture is that something to do with the game of bingo is featured in the piece.

We're not looking for a particular kind of fiction either, it could be a romance, a thriller, a horror, a comedy or anything!

Story Length

The minimum length for the fictional story is 1500 words, the maximum 3000 words.

Language

All entries must be in English.

Judges

Judging will be done by the editorial team of Playing Bingo, a number of whom are published writers. We've also enlisted the help of award winning novelist and short story writer Rachel Trezise to participate in the final judgement.

Entry Fees

The competition is free to enter, the only thing we ask is if you have a blog or a website, please share a link* to the competition for other budding writers (*completely optional!)

Previous Use

All entries must be original and unpublished (in print, digitally or on the web.) All entries whether winning or not will be published on the Playing Bingo website.

Competition Closing Date

The final date for entries is the 28th of February 2013.

How To Submit Your Entry

Entries must be sent as a Word doc file (.doc or .docx). Make sure each entry includes the title of the piece in the file but not your name and details. Please add your name and address to the email. No more than two entries are allowed per person.

Email entry to: COMPETITION CLOSED

Full Competition Terms And Conditions

Competition open to UK and Ireland residents, aged 18 and over.
Closing date for receipt of entries is 28th February 2013 at midnight BST.
The minimum length for the fictional story is 1500 words, the maximum 3000 words. It is to be written in English.
Entries can only be made via email attachment as a Word .doc or .docx file.
The competition will be judged anonymously, the author must not include their name in the document. Each story received will be given a tracking number to identify it. The stories must be free of all personal information about the author. This includes age and address.
Entrants must include their name and address in the email sent with the attached story entries.
All email entries will be acknowledged by email, if we you don't receive an email back from us within 3 days of submission, your entry has not been received and you should try again.
The competition is open to all writers, whether they have been previously published or not.
Entry to the competition is free of charge, but submissions are limited to 2 per person.
All entries must be original, must be previously unpublished, and must remain unpublished before March 31st 2013. This includes any form of publication, including print, ebook or online (e.g. on a blog). Any entry found to have been plagiarised will be disqualified.
You must be the copyright holder for any work you enter into the competition.
All entrants must agree to have their work published in both print and ebook formats, should they be one of the authors of the shortlisted stories. Authors will retain worldwide copyright on their work (including film and dramatic rights) but Playing Bingo has first publication rights to publish the shortlisted stories in an anthology, in both print and ebook formats.
All entrants also agree to have their story published on the Playing Bingo website, irrespective of whether they are shortlisted or not.
All shortlisted entrants will receive a copy of the published anthology. If there is a demand for the anthology, it could go on to be sold. Entrants will not be liable to royalties from any commercial sale of the anthology, but license us to use their work commercially in this manner. Profits from any sale of the anthology will go back into the administration of subsequent creative competitions at Playing Bingo.
You will be clearly identified as the author of any published work in the book and must agree to this publicity. You can, however, use a pseudonym if you wish.
You must warrant that your entry does not infringe any law or regulation or third party right, including (but not limited to) the law of copyright or trademarks.
The prize is nonnegotiable, and will be paid to the winners by cheque. No alternative prize or payment method will be offered.
No competitor may win more than one prize. Entries will be read by a panel of professional editorial staff and published writers. This judging panel will select the 10 - 20 stories to be shortlisted. The named judging panel will then select the 4 prize winning stories from the shortlist. The judges decision is final and no individual correspondence will be entered into. Judges or readers are unable to comment on individual entries.
Prizes are as follows: 1st £300, 2nd £100, 2 x 3rd £50. Each of the shortlisted finalists will receive a copy of the anthology once it is published.
The winners will be announced on Friday 29th of March 2013 here on the competition page, and winners will be notified by email. We require all winners to respond to their winners email before the prize will be awarded. Failure to respond within 2 weeks of contact will mean forfeiture of prize which will roll over to the next competition's prize fund.
Any entrant wishing to withdraw a story from the competition before the closing date of midnight (BST) February 28th 2013 will need to contact us via the competition email.
The competition is run as a promotional event by Day Trip Media - all winners agree to the use of their names (or pen names) and stories in further promotions by Day Trip Media for Playing Bingo.
Entry implies an acceptance of all the 1st Playing Bingo Short Story Competition rules. Entries that fail to comply with the entry rules and requirements will be disqualified.