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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware In my last blog post, I discussed how to recognize and avoid profitmaking writing awards --fake awards that exist not to honor writers, but to enrich sponsors. If you're looking to win writing awards and enter writing competitions, though, the profiteering fakers aren't the only risk you face. For instance...the short story competitions run by Scotland's Almond Press .* Almond's output is tiny--founded in 2012, it has published just three anthologies of stories collected from its annual competitions--but it boasts some impressive sponsors, including Booktrust UK and the University of Stirling, as well as a nice website and attractively-designed book covers. Its contests have no entry fees, and there's a 100 GBP prize for the winner, who is also promised "Exposure and publicity via our online presence". Its Terms and Conditions , however, stink. Simply by submitting a story to the competition, writers grant ...

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware If you've been reading this blog for any length of time, you may have guessed that I'm not a big fan of writing contests and awards. Partly this is because so many are a waste of time, with minimal prizes, negligible prestige, and zero cachet on your writing resume. Why not spend your energy on something that can get you closer to building a readership--submitting for publication, or publishing on your own? There's also the risk of bad things in the entry guidelines--for instance, the Emerging Writer Awards, where simply submitting constituted a grant of publishing rights . Writers who don't read the fine print carefully enough may find themselves trapped by such provisions. And then there are the contests/awards with a hidden agenda: making money for the sponsor. Such awards aren't really about honoring writers at all. There's a complex of red flags that identifies profiteering contest and awards programs. - S...