Power of Words Writing Competition

This year, entrants are asked to write to one of a selection of photographs of Latrobe City. View the photos at the bottom of the page. Take a creative look at Latrobe City and make your prose sing.

• Entries must be fiction, submitted in Arial or Times Roman font size 11, double-spaced, printed on one side of the paper only. Story length must not exceed 2000 words. Enter online or download an entry form. 
• Complete the entry form and attach it to your story. Do not put your name on the story. Entrants must be aged over 18 years.
• Email your entry to libraryevents@latrobe. vic.gov.au, with the subject header ‘Power of Words’ no later than 5pm (AEST) on Friday 26 August 2022.
• No hand-written entries will be permitted. Entries must not have been published previously and/or have been used to win prizes in any other competitions.
• Our judges will be looking for stories that show originality and imagination, promote Latrobe City and are well structured.
• One prize of $500 will be awarded to the winning story. Certificates will be awarded to highly commended stories. Winning or awarded stories may be posted on the Latrobe City Libraries website and printed in an anthology to be published at a later date. The successful entries will be announced at a presentation in late 2022 at a venue and on a date to be confirmed. Only the entrants who have submitted winning or awarded stories will be contacted.
• The judges’ decision is final. Please understand we cannot provide feedback to individual entrants.

There is one prize of $500 for the winning story. Runners-up certificates will be awarded. The winning and selected stories will be published in an anthology to be printed by Reader’s Emporium book shop in Traralgon. Copies of the anthology will be available for purchase at the shop and at Latrobe City Libraries.

The Winners

Congratulations to all those who entered, and particularly to the winners. 

First Prize:

• Eight Chimneys by Celeste Brittain 

Read more about Celeste 

Runner Up:

• Luck Filled Platypus by Gary Garside

Read more about Gary

Runner Up:

• Mahogany by Emma Bamford

Read more about Emma

Judges Report

This year’s competition launched at the Latrobe Literary Festival in May and closed in August. It did not attract enough entries to be able to award the full prize, and some of the stories did not meet the criteria of being fictional, rather than travel writing or memoirs. However, the entries that did fit the criteria were generally well-written and used the backdrop of Latrobe City in memorable and creative ways.

Judges were looking for entries that used the local setting intuitively, and that had well drawn characters, a developed plot and a clear structure. Points were also awarded for creativity and imagination. The three winning stories shared these attributes and the scores were very close. However, there was a clear winner, and that top-placed story was well written using a strong understanding of the craft of short story writing to entice the reader into the heart of the story.

Well done to all the entrants. Even if your story did not place, you still managed to put your thoughts down on paper and enter the competition. That is a win in itself.

Congratulations to our winner and runners-up. Here are the judges’ comments, author bios and winning entries.