A Dystopian Short Story Contest That Scores the Person, Not the Premise
Quick answer: A dystopian short story contest with a published rubric: Writory accepts stories of 100 to 3,000 words, judged blind on structure, character, language, voice and after-effect. The premise earns nothing on its own; the person inside the system earns the marks. Entry is $8, the deadline is 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, and every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100.
Writory's short story contest reads dystopian fiction of 100 to 3,000 words in any language, judged blind against a published rubric. Entry is $8, the deadline is 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, and every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100.
How the rubric reads a dystopia
A dystopian story is judged as a dystopian story, and the premise is not a mark. Surveillance states, rationed water, a lottery that kills: the judges have read them and the rubric gives nothing for the idea. Originality & Voice, 20 points, is scored on the angle into the idea. Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" (1948) is a village stoning told as a summer chore, and the angle is the chore. Kurt Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron" (1961) makes enforced equality a domestic scene with a television. The system is old; the doorway is what scores.
Character & Emotional Impact carries 25 points, and this is where dystopias most often fail in a contest. A story that tours the regime, explaining its ministries and its rules, has spent its words on a place instead of a person. Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" (1973) is almost all description and still lands, because the description exists to make the reader choose. If your reader is not made to want something for someone, the world you built will not save the score.
Craft notes for dystopia in 100 to 3,000 words
Show the system through one act of compliance. The most frightening line in a dystopia is usually a character doing something ordinary that the regime requires: filling a form, saying a slogan at breakfast, not looking at a neighbour. That single act tells the reader more than a page of exposition and costs fewer words. Language & Craft, worth 20 points, marks exposition down, so the ministry's history should stay in your notes unless a character has a reason to say it aloud.
Give the rule a price the character personally pays. Orwell's Winston loses Julia; Bradbury's Montag in Fahrenheit 451 (1953) loses his wife to the wall screens before he loses anything to the state. Escape is not required. Many of the best short dystopias end in compliance, and Impact & Resonance, the final 10 points, is often higher for an ending that closes the door than for one that opens it. Resist the twist that reveals the narrator was the oppressor all along; it has been done, and the panel has read it.
Keep the real world's texture. Yevgeny Zamyatin's We (1924) and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World (1932) are memorable for their furniture: glass apartments, feelies, soma. Invent two or three specific objects and use them repeatedly rather than inventing twenty and mentioning each once. At 100 to 3,000 words you do not have space for a glossary, and a judge reading blind will not stop to work one out. Starting points, if you want one, are at /short-story-prompts.
Any language, one pool, and what you receive
Dystopia is written everywhere, and Writory reads stories in any language in that language, in one pool with everything else in the round; a Hindi story about a rationed city stands beside an English one about a scored citizenry. Writers must be 13 or over and the work must be original. Entry is $8 for one story, $14 for two and $25 for five, each judged separately. The first contest runs from 1 September to 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, with results and certificates on 30 November 2026. From December the contest is monthly: entries close on the 25th, results on the 30th, and the next round opens the moment they land.
Every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100 on 30 November 2026, with the five marks shown separately: Storytelling & Structure 25, Character & Emotional Impact 25, Language & Craft 20, Originality & Voice 20, Impact & Resonance 10. The top story takes $100 and free entry to the next round, and writers keep all rights. Optional written feedback is available at entry, and the full criteria are at /short-story-judging-criteria.
The published rubric, 100 points
- Storytelling & Structure (25 points): Does every scene cause the next, and does the ending pay off the opening?
- Character & Emotional Impact (25 points): Do we want something with your character, and does the story make us feel it?
- Language & Craft (20 points): Clean, deliberate prose: rhythm, precision, and nothing wasted.
- Originality & Voice (20 points): The angle only you could write, told in a voice that sounds like nobody else.
- Impact & Resonance (10 points): What the story leaves behind after the last line.
How it works
Submit an original story of 100 to 3,000 words by 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST. Every story is judged blind against the rubric above, and results arrive on 30 November 2026: every entrant receives a certificate with their name and a score out of 100. Writers keep all rights. Monthly winners earn free entry to the next round. Enter at https://writoryofficial.com/submit-story.
Common questions
Is dystopian fiction eligible?
Yes. The contest accepts original stories of 100 to 3,000 words in any genre, and a dystopia is read as a dystopia: the judges ask whether the person inside the system is someone we want something for, and whether the ending pays off the rule. The premise itself earns no marks.
How much does it cost to enter?
$8 for one story, $14 for two, $25 for five, each judged and scored separately. The winner of a round takes $100 and free entry to the next round; free entry is earned that way and is not open to everyone.
What do I receive if my story does not win?
A certificate and a score out of 100 broken into the five rubric marks. For a dystopia the split is telling: a high Originality & Voice mark with a low Character & Emotional Impact mark means the idea landed and the person did not, which is the genre's most common fault.
Is 3,000 words enough to build a world?
It is enough to build a room in one. Short dystopias work by implying the system through a few objects and one act of compliance rather than by mapping it, and stories that attempt the map usually lose structure marks. Anything from 100 to 3,000 words is eligible.
Does the story have to be set in the future?
No. Dystopia is a condition, not a date. "The Lottery" is set in a present-day American village; a story about a real regime told from inside its rules, or an alternative present, is equally eligible. What the judges read for is a system with a price and a person paying it.
Can my dystopia be about a real current political situation?
Yes, provided it is fiction and your own. Judging is blind and reads the story on the five published marks, not on its politics. A story that argues will usually score lower on Character & Emotional Impact than one that shows; put the argument in what a character does at breakfast.
More story contest pages
About Writory
Writory (writoryofficial.com) is an international monthly poetry contest founded in 2025 by Shivay Mehra. Poets from 31 countries have entered, readers come from over 150 countries, and every submitted poem is judged and scored out of 100 across five criteria: creativity, emotion, structure, language and impact and resonance. Every entrant receives a certificate; winners receive cash prizes and are published by name. Entries close on the 25th of each month and results are announced on the 30th. Writory is listed by Duotrope, Poetry Kit, Christopher Fielden's competition list and Creative Writing NZ, among other organisations. Past results are public at past winners and the leaderboard.