The
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The Micro-Fiction Showcase is a three month long celebration of the shortest literary form. These micro-fiction competitions run monthly through-out the summer and are for very, very short stories and short poems. They are fun, and fascinating, and anyone can write a good one.
The cost is only €2 per entry, so the idea is to get a whole bunch together: either all by yourself or from husbands and wives, uncles and aunts, sons and lovers, workmates and schoolmates and soulmates, friends, romans and countrymen, the good the bad and the ugly. Gather them all up and then submit them all one-by-one. You can pay for them all either separately, one at a time, or in one big bunch. The winners will appear in next year's Fish Anthology!
The Micro-Fiction Showcase is sponsored by E-FASTNET WEB DESIGN .
Micro-Fiction Showcase - Competition Summary (Enter NOW!)
Summary - The Rules - Entry Fees - On-Line Entries - Examples
Title: Micro-Fiction Showcase
Opens: 1 May 2008
Closing date: 31 July 2008
Monthly results: 12th of each folllowing month
Final Results: 31 August 2008
Summary
There are three, month-long competitions, during May. June and July.
These competitions are for micro-fiction. Based on last year's Showcase
we have extended our definition of Micro-Fiction to allow for up to
60 words for stories and up to eight-lines for poems.
The very best entries in each of these categories will be displayed
in the 2008 Micro-Fiction Showcase
and each month there will be four winners in each category. Each winner
will recieve a prize of €25 and a copy of the Fish Anthology 2008,
and their entry will appear in the Fish Anthology 2009.
At the end of July, the winning entries from all three monthly competitions will form the final short-list from which one winner will be selected from both the short stories and the poems. These overall winners will receive a further prize of €500 together with a free personal web-site, sponsored by E-Fastnet.
All winning entries will appear in the Fish Anthology 2009.
The Rules
No entry form is needed. Entry is on-line only
The Prize is open to writers of any nationality writing in English.
There is no restriction on style or theme.
Stories must be 60 owords or less, not including the title.
Poems must be eight lines or less!
All entries must be available for the Anthology and must not have been previously published.
Multiple entries are allowed. (And indeed, encouraged!)
Copyright remains with the author.
Notification of receipt of entry will normally be by email.
The judges' verdict is final.
No correspondence will be entered into once work has been submitted.
Stories cannot be altered or changed after they have been entered.
Entry Fees
The cost of an On-line entry is fixed in Euro and any translation into your local currency will be done automatically by your credit card company according to the current exchange rate.
Payment is by credit card only.
| On-Line Entry € |
|
| Per Entry | €2.00 |
Enter Now
On-Line Entries
ALL ENTRIES MUST BE SUBMITTED ON-LINE THROUGH OUR WEB SITE. PLEASE DO NOT SEND ENTRIES AS E-MAIL ATTACHMENTS.
PLEASE ENSURE THE TITLE OF THE STORY DOES NOT APPEAR ON THE FIRST PAGE, THE TITLE IS AUTOMATICALLY APPENDED BY THE SYSTEM.
PLEASE DO NOT PUT YOUR NAME ON THE STORY. YOUR STORY IS AUTOMATICALLY LINKED TO YOUR NAME.
For technical support press: techsupport@fishpublishing.com
Terms and Conditions for Fish Publishing Micro Fiction Showcase Prize 2008
Efastnet will provide the two top prize winners of the Micro-Fiction Showcase Competition 2008 with a personal web site, limited to one page, with unlimited text and up to four pictures, including Domain registration and hosting of the site for one year. One e-mail address will be provided with the site.
Any changes and additional content design provided to Efastnet by Fish Publishing will be updated on the site free of charge for one year, up to a maximum of one hour per month.
If after 12 months you wish to continue with the site, the domain and hosting charges will be €99 per year thereafter, and the winners will have the option, at any time, to upgrade to a multi-page site including additional e-mail addresses and advanced hosting at a price to be agreed with Efastnet.
Below are the winners of the just-for-fun Fish Micro Fiction Competition - January 2007
Over-All Winner - Micro-Story
Unseen
There's a tiger inside me. Roaming at the lake
water nearby, I'm grassing around alone, hoping a mermaid will see me
from the depth and say. "There's a tiger inside you. I can see
him."
Marlin Santoso - Jakarta, Indonesia
Over-All Winner - Four-Line
Verse
Apple Trees in April
Snowflakes drift down through
apple blossoms,
. a Japanese painting suspended in cold
spring air.
April showers shiver white, glint like white-faced geishas
. peeking through the dappled branches.
Rose Donisi - New Jersey, USA
The rest of the winners!
The Price of Coal
Coal dust fell
from his clothes onto the lino
as they laid him on the bed,
which creaked like winding gear.
Later, his wife washed his face in the darkness.
Margaret Lyon - Temple Cowley, UK
FOUNDATION STONE 2021
Dedicated to all Human Beings
On Planet Earth
From whence
Four courageous individuals
Arrived at this spot
MONS.OLYMPUS.MARS
And became the First Humans
To walk on Martian Soil
Dan J.J. Kahn - Sheffield, UK
present tense of being a woman
I am sorry (you are sorry, she
is sorry)
we are sorry
you are sorry
they are very, very, very sorry.
Berta Freistadt - London, UK
LUANG PRABANG II (A Travel Microstory)
By the Mekong, an old Laotian offers me his moonshine.
He says I look like a ghost, with my pale skin and grey eyes.
But real ghosts do not drink.
Tihana Majcen - Quebec. Canada
Dawn in the 15th Arrondisement
The first bird feels the first
beat of the dawn.
His six clear notes to the dark are answered by
single sleepy cheeps spread along the vine covered wall
A dove chortles the morning haiku, each coo a koan of the coming day.
Nancy Norton - Amsterdam, Netherlands
Australian City Summer
The
mess of feathers on the bitumen signified a dead parrot.
Yet
one defiantly iridescent green wing flapped above the
mangled body, pointing treewards, yearning for sky.
Sally Jones - Perth, Western Australia
READING GAOL
I was a very quiet but, I think,
precocious child
and know I even revelled in the poems of Oscar Wilde.
At only ten my face, I do recall, went very pale
when I at night, by candlelight, discovered 'Reading Gaol'.
Mary Hovenden (Age 90) - Moray, Scotland
Hide & Seek
I pant. He pursues. I hide.
He seeks. I inhale. He listens intently.
I can't withhold breath any longer.
I breathe out.
He grabs.
I scream...one more time.
Emma Akuffo- Bishops Stortford, UK
One Line Short of a Limerick .
As a limerick-writer, I wish
To enter a poem - but Fish
Has set a line limit
So I've no chance to win it.
David MacKenzie - Minster Lovell, UK
Riverton Yacht Club
Flashing from the river dawn after a night
of light rain
Sun-drifting sailboats in drying breezes
Large spider webs sprung from mast to hull-
Pulsing wet geometry
Louise Love - Colorado, USA
The Iniquitous Disguises
They must have rubbed their tongue and lips
with sugarcane driplets again, hoping that their sweetened black lies
will lure our desires,
that we might cast our votes on them.
Akinkunmi Ogunbiyi - Lagos, Nigeria
Love Is
Love is like the sun:
it rises,
it sets
and it burns like hell.
Michele Boylan - Inish Mor, Aran Islands
An Gaeltacht
My Connemara cottage
is as white as a snowman,
and my door is as red
as an apple in an siopa.
Fintan Boylan (Aged 7) - Inish Mor, Aran Islands
Egg Box
Eddie the egg felt the shaft
of light fall on him in the egg box.
He held his breath.
When you're an egg, things can very quickly go very wrong.
Albie Godson - Co. Wexford, Ireland
Big Ted
He really is tatty, his ear is askew
His pride has been torn all to shreds
His grin is lopsided, his fur nearly gone
But he'll always be with me, Big Ted.
Ailish Teague - Seaforde, N. Ireland
Canal View
Shadow bicycles racing raindrops splashed on
a red brick wall;
the full color flicker of lives played out in shadow box apartments.
Where the coming and going of lamp-light tells the time of day.
Nancy Norton -Amsterdam, Netherlands
From an Apartment on the Upper West Side
I wish I lived in
!!! New York !!!
But I don't. I just live
[[[here]]]
Season Butler - (Currently) London, UK
Thriller Section
Kate felt someone looking over
her shoulder in a dusty corner of
the library. She grabbed books with hard combative covers and
rehearsed some dodgy karate. The librarian fled.
Stella Lombard - Lane Cove. NSW, Australia
The Fish Anthologies
Novels & Other Titles
Writing Short Stories
Our new Writing feature provides some suggestions on the art of story writing. The page is designed to provide writers with on-going, constructive information about how other authors achieved success with writing short fiction. For more information visit our Writing Short Stories page.
Online Book Shop
You can buy Fish Publishing's Anthologies of short stories on-line in our online book shop – The Fish Shop.
Online Entry
Our Fish-On-Line online entry system provides a convenient way to enter our contests on the web. Register as an online Fish author and you can enter current and forthcoming Writing Contests. Writers may also enter any of our competitions by post. See our Writing Contests page for full details
Writing Contests - Assistance
Fish Publishing offers an Editorial Consultancy and Critique Service. designed to provide writers thinking of entering writing competitions with constructive feedback on their work, whether it is a complete novel or just the beginnings. The Service is available to writers prior to entering the Fish writing competitions.