When did it all begin? Founded in 2014 as the Young Writers Short Fiction Contest, Fiction Fantastic is an annual fiction contest for upper elementary, middle, and high school students in Lane County, Oregon. This contest is free to students attending public, private, and homeschool.
Fun Facts
- Fiction Fantastic had over 170 entries from students across Lane county in 2018.
- The total number of words submitted by contestants in 2018 was 170,383.
- Elementary school students submitted the most stories in 2018, 2019, and 2020.
- In 2021 and 2022, middle school students entered the most stories of the contest as well as the most for the category in a single year.
Contest Prizes
Prizes are awarded for First, Second, and Third Place in each grade level category.
- First Place – $100
- Second Place – $50
- Third Place – $25
All winning submissions will be published in the annual Fiction Fantastic Anthology (including honorable mentions.)
Interested in being a sponsor for Fiction Fantastic or other Young Writers events? Contact us at bewriting@wordcraftersineugene.org.
The Judging Process
Each year we get an amazing group of VIP judges together that include authors, teachers, and other arts-oriented community members to read the contest submissions. Last year we had over 20 judges!
- Judging is blind.
- Submissions will go through two rounds of judging, with a possible third round (depending on the number of submissions).
- Submissions will be ranked by total scores based on grade level criteria (see below).
- The top five scoring stories of each grade level will be judged by a celebrity author for placement in first, second, third, and honorable mention (if applicable).
Interested in being a judge for Fiction Fantastic? Fill out the judging interest form to be considered.
Judging Criterion
The following gives a breakdown of what judges are looking at for each grade level.
Elementary (Grades 3-5) Criteria
- Story is original, creative, and engages the reader.
- Story has a clear beginning, middle, and end.
- Story has clear conflict and resolution.
- Story uses age-appropriate sentence structure and vocabulary.
Middle (Grades 6-8) Criteria
- Story is original, creative, and engages the reader.
- Story has a clear beginning, middle, and end.
- Story has clear conflict and resolution.
- Story uses age-appropriate sentence structure and vocabulary.
- Story has a balanced narrative arc.
- Story makes artful use of dialogue.
High (Grades 9-12) Criteria
- Story is original, creative, and engages the reader.
- Story has a clear beginning, middle, and end.
- Story has clear conflict and resolution.
- Story uses age-appropriate sentence structure and vocabulary.
- Story has a balanced narrative arc.
- Story makes artful use of dialogue and/or internal monologue.
- Story successfully uses scene and summary.
- Story’s characters have dimension.