Short Story & Poetry Contest

Guidelines:

• The 2025 Short Story & Poetry Contest opens January 6, 2025 and will end at 5:00pm on March 14, 2025. 
• Open to all residents of the greater Lansing area, ages 6 and up.
• Entries should be submitted in English.
• Maximum length is 8000 characters (including spaces) (about 1100-2000 words).
• One entry per person and entries must be typed and not handwritten. 
• The work must be fictional, or deal with historical or biographical topics in a literary manner.
• Any entry that, in the library’s sole and absolute discretion (i) is obscene, profane, lewd or defamatory; (ii) includes anti-social content; (iii) does not meet the requirements outlined in the Official Rules; or (iv) is otherwise objectionable; may not be considered and may be disqualified.
• The author declares that they are the sole author of any text they submit. Entries must not be plagiarized, written by someone else or generated by artificial intelligence. The author declares that they control the copyright of the submitted text, meaning that they have never transferred these rights to a third person/entity. All characters must be original. Copyrighted names are not allowed.
• The author grants a non-exclusive right to the project organizer to reproduce, correct and publish their stories via Short Story Dispensers, website, and in print at the Delta Township District Library.
• The copyright of the work shall remain with the author. The author agrees and acknowledges that in this specific case, publication and distribution of their work shall not result in the payment of royalties from Short Édition.
• If a selected winner cannot be contacted, is ineligible, or fails to claim a prize in a timely manner, the prize may be forfeited.
• The coordinators of the Delta Township District Library project have sole discretion in selecting works for distribution via the Short Story Dispenser, website, and in print. They may also reject or remove works from the dispenser and website without giving any prior notice or justification to the author.
• The author can also ask for their work to be removed by notifying the project coordinators in writing.
• The information contained in these official rules is for reference only and is subject to change. DTDL reserves the right to revise, amend, or repeal these basic contest rules at any time.

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