Christmas Countdown
Each festive season we count down to Christmas with the online publication of 10 seasonal stories. The winning stories will be published in December — one a day starting 12th December — and in true advent calendar style the prizes are revealed when the story is published.
Entry fee: £8
Deadline for entries: 25th October 2026
Max word count: 1000
Stories can have been previously published as long as you retain the publication rights and the publication date was before October 2025.
Competition T&Cs
Submit stories written in English through Submittable by 23.59 GMT on the deadline date (sorry late entries will not be included).
Please include a word count on the story document
Maximum word count is 1000 (excluding title) but there is no minimum. Please do not submit stories above this word count as they will be automatically disqualified. Sorry!
Stories must be your own original work and they can have been previously published as long as you retain the publication rights and the publication date was before October 2025.
By entering the competition you agree to your story being published on the WestWord website.
If you enter the story elsewhere and it is accepted for publication before judging takes place then you will have to withdraw it and no entry fees will be refundable.
Stories can be in any genre apart from children’s fiction.
You can enter multiple stories but the entry fee is payable each time and each story must be submitted separately.
The judge’s decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.