Competition Deadline: Deepings Literary Festival Short Story Festival 2026
March 9
From the competition website:
Theme – Hidden Treasures
Please give your story a title, which can be different from Hidden Treasures as long as that is clearly the theme.
Submissions
All entries will be read by members of the DLF committee and the top stories put forward to category judges:
Children’s category judge: Barbara Henderson (award-winning author of children’s novels and adult non-fiction; she also works as a drama teacher and visits schools as an author and storyteller).
Adult’s category judge: Vaseem Khan (author of two award-winning crime series and books in a series featuring Q from the James Bond franchise; he was the Chair of the UK Crime Writers’ Association in 2023–25).
Closing date
Monday 9th March 2026. Entries received after this date will not be considered. Please aim to send your entry in as soon as you can rather than wait for the closing date.
Prizes
Winners will each receive a £30 book token and the opportunity to have their story published in I’d Rather be in Deeping magazine.
Enter here.