A Love Story Writing Competition Where the Ending Is Yours to Choose
Quick answer: A love story writing competition with a published rubric: Writory accepts original love stories of 100 to 3,000 words, judged blind on the five published marks, and the ending may be happy, unhappy or unresolved. Entry is $8, the deadline is 25 November 2026 at 11:59 PM IST, the top story takes $100, and every entrant receives a certificate and a score out of 100.
Writory's short story contest reads love stories of 100 to 3,000 words in any language, judged blind against a published rubric, with no requirement that the lovers end up together. 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.
A love story is not a romance, and the rubric knows the difference
Romance is a genre with a contract: the couple ends together. A love story has no contract. Anton Chekhov's "The Lady with the Dog" (1899) ends with two people who have just realised the hardest part is ahead of them; James Joyce's "The Dead" (1914) ends with a husband learning his wife once loved someone else; Annie Proulx's "Brokeback Mountain" (1997) ends with a shirt in a closet. Writory reads a love story as the story it attempts, and Storytelling & Structure, 25 points, asks only whether the ending pays off the opening, not whether it is happy.
Character & Emotional Impact, another 25 points, is the heart of the form and the hardest mark to earn. The reader has to want something for at least one of the two people, and the wanting has to be specific. "She loved him" is a claim; the way she keeps his mug on the left of the shelf is evidence. Judges reading blind mark the evidence. Raymond Carver's "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" (1981) is four people at a table with gin, and the love is in the arguing.
Craft notes for a love story in 100 to 3,000 words
Put the obstacle inside the people. External obstacles, the disapproving family, the ocean between them, are plot; the love story's real obstacle is what each person cannot say. Jhumpa Lahiri's "A Temporary Matter" (1999) uses a power cut to make two people talk, and the ending depends on what they say when the lights are still off. Make the beloved specific: a reader falls for a particular person, not for "warm eyes". One physical habit, repeated, does more than a page of description.
Write the dialogue for what is not said. Love stories die of characters explaining their feelings, and Language & Craft, 20 points, marks that down. Find an object the relationship lives in, a coat, a record, a bus route, and let the object change meaning across the story. O. Henry's "The Gift of the Magi" (1905) is a watch and a head of hair. End on a change in one person's understanding, not on a kiss or a departure; Impact & Resonance, the last 10 points, is what the reader carries away after the door closes.
Avoid the meeting as an opening unless the story is about the meeting. Begin later, when the two people already have a history the reader can infer from how they hand each other things. Alice Munro's "The Bear Came Over the Mountain" (1999) opens after forty years of marriage and finds the love story inside a care home. The free Story Craft course at /academy/story-craft covers character and ending at this length, and /short-story-prompts has starting points.
Any language, one pool, and what you receive
Love stories are written in every language and Writory reads them in the language they were written, in one pool with everything else in the round; an Urdu story about an arranged match stands beside an English one about a divorce. 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; free entry is earned, not open to all. Writers keep all rights. Optional written feedback is available at entry, and the criteria are published 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 a love story eligible in the Writory short story contest?
Yes. The contest accepts original stories of 100 to 3,000 words in any genre, and a love story is read as a love story. There is no requirement that the couple end together, no bar on unrequited or ended love, and no separate romance category; the five published marks apply as they do to everything else.
How much does entry cost?
$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 split into the five rubric marks. For a love story the Character & Emotional Impact line is the one to read: it tells you whether the judges wanted something for your two people or merely watched them, and that is the mark the form lives or dies on.
How long should a love story be?
Anything from 100 to 3,000 words is eligible. Most of the stories named on this page run between 2,000 and 7,000 words, so the cap asks you to choose one evening, one conversation or one object rather than the whole relationship. A 300-word love story is also complete if its single turn lands.
Does the love have to be romantic?
No. Love between a parent and child, two old friends, or a person and a place is eligible and is read on the same marks. The phrase "love story" describes what is at stake, not who is allowed to be in it, and some of the strongest entries in the form are not about couples at all.
Can I write about a real relationship from my own life?
Yes, as fiction. Change what needs changing and shape it so it has an opening, a turn and an ending; a diary entry is not a story and will score as one. Judging is blind, so nobody reading it knows whose life it came from, and writers keep all rights to what they enter.
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.