The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 | Deadline: November 30, 2024

The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 is currently open for submission. Interested writers are invited to submit their best work in contest for prize.

The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024

The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 is currently open for submission. Interested writers are invited to submit their best work in contest for the cash prizes and other writing opportunities attached.

About The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024

The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 is a £5,000 international writing prize for emerging writers of children’s novels, chapter books, YA novels and picture book texts.

Submissions are open worldwide until November 30th. The winner will be announced in February 2025 and awarded £5,000, along with our beautiful Minerva trophy, based on the world famous sculpture in Bath’s Roman Baths.

2024’s winning manuscript will be judged by literary agent Enrichetta Frezzato of Curtis Brown, from a shortlist chosen by Junior Judges aged seven to seventeen years.

Eligibility Criteria and Submission Guidelines for the Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024

The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 is a writing competition for emerging authors. 

For the purposes of the competition, emerging authors are defined as: ‘unagented writers who are yet to accept an offer of publication, for a novel or children’s fiction book, which includes an advance (pre-publication) payment from the publisher.’

• Entrants may be of any age, nationality or residency.
• We accept: YA novels; novels for teens; children’s novels; early readers; chapter books and the text of picture books
• Full manuscripts may be of any length. Typical industry word counts are 500 – 600 words per picture book, 6-10,000 for a chapter book, 40-60,000 for middle grade and 50-70,000 words for YA, or longer for fantasy novels.
• Submissions may be unpublished, self published or published without an advance.
• Submissions must be the author’s original work.
• Submissions should not be produced or edited by Chat GPT or any other AI creation tool.
• Employees of the Bath Novel Awards, Cornerstones Literary Consultancy, Professional Writing Academy and the judge’s literary agency are not eligible to win.

Prizes

• The winner of the Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 will be announced at www.bathnovelaward.co.uk in February 2025 and awarded £5,000 GBP. In the event of a joint win, the prize money will be shared equally between winners.
• By entering, the winner agrees to an interview which may be published on our site and in any media for publicity purposes.
• Titles of the longlisted extracts/synopses will be announced in December 2024, with longlisted writers then invited to submit their full manuscripts for the shortlist judging stages.
• The shortlisted fulls will be announced in January 2025.
• Shortlistees will win a compilation of award readers’ feedback on their full manuscripts.
• Entrants retain full copyright, however by entering, all shortlisted entrants give permission for us to post an extract of up to 5,000 words on our site.
• All listees will win a paragraph of feedback from an editorial director at Cornerstones Literary Consultancy on their initial opening pages. This feedback will be provided after the winning novel or book has been announced.
• The writer of the most promising longlisted novel or book, as judged by Cornerstones Literary Consultancy and announced in February 2025, will receive a free place on the 18 week online course Edit Your Novel the Professional Way. The course is non-transferable and there is no cash alternative to this prize.
• The judge’s decision is final, and no correspondence will be entered into concerning this decision. The Bath Novel Awards reserve the right to change the judge without notice.

Other Writing Competitions Open for Submissions

• Kelpies Prize for Writing 2025 | Deadline: February 28, 2025
• Margery Allingham Short Mystery Competition 2025 | Deadline: February 28, 2025
• The Bournemouth Writing Prize 2025 | Deadline: January 15, 2025
• New2theScene Poetry Competition 2024 | Deadline: December 1, 2024
• The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 | Deadline: November 30, 2024
• Anthology Travel Writing Competition 2024 | Deadline: November 30, 2024.
• Anthology Short Story Competition 2025 | Deadline: July 31, 2025
• Anthology Flash Fiction Competition | Deadline: September 30, 2025

Initial submissions

• The closing date for entries is 23:59 GMT, 30th November 2024.
• Your submissions document should be a single Word document or PDF, This document should include the opening of your book up to a maximum of 5,000 words, double-spaced in a size 12 font followed by a one page synopsis which should be single-spaced in a size 12 font. For picture book texts, your submissions document should include the text of up to three books followed by a page of short summaries.
• We recommend presenting your manuscript using industry standard formatting, anonymised. (If you are not sure what industry standard formatting is, please see: how to format a novel manuscript or how to format picture book text)
• As our prizes are judged blind, your name and contact details should not appear in your extract/synopsis document.
• Entries should not include any photographs, maps, artwork or cover images.
• Novels or books should be submitted in English.
• The entrance fee is £29.99 (including VAT) per novel or chapter book, or a submission of up to three picture book texts. You may enter as many times as you wish.
• Entries should be submitted using our online entry form.
• Sponsored places are available for writers on a low income via our sponsored places application form.
• Submissions may not be altered after entry and entries which do not comply with the competition terms may be disqualified.

Submit Here