Judging Criteria

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Prose/full-length novel

➳ Showcase (Title/Cover/Blurb) / 5
The most weight is placed on your blurb for these marks.

➳ Premise and Hook / 10 
How well you keep your audience engaged throughout, and the quality of your demonstrated premise.

➳ Exposition / 10
Appropriate use of showing and telling.

➳  Plot / 20 
Round 1 focuses on initiating your plot. Round 2 focuses on its early progression. Round 3 looks at your plot as a whole.

➳ Character Development / 20
Whether your characters are interesting, multi-dimensional, and appear to believably affect the story with their flaws and actions.

➳ World building & setting / 20
Includes use of description to ground setting, and how well-developed your setting is.

➳ Grammar & delivery /5
This puts more stock on how well your writing functions to deliver information than particulars of comma placement.

➳ Overall Performance /10
Includes general enjoyment, genre-fit, and originality.

Total /100

(Judges, you will be sent a full breakdown of what we are looking for in this criteria. Participants are free to request)


The contest will be held in rounds for full works of prose

Round 1: First 3 chapters evaluated

Round 2: First 8 chapters evaluated

Round 3: Entire story evaluated

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Poetry

➳ Title/Cover /5

➳ Blurb /5

➳ Grammar/flow/rhythm /10

➳ Creativity /20

➳ Thematic Elements /20

➳ Symbolism/metaphors /20

➳ Clarity /20

Total /100

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Short Story

➳ Quality of Writing / 20 (writing, style, flow, grammar, etc.

➳ Quality of Character(s) / 20 (believability, balanced in flaws / strengths, etc.

➳ Quality of Story / 20 (plot, interesting, etc.

➳ Creativity / 20 (original ideas, clarity in presentation, etc.)

➳ Overall / 20 (If you were to give it a score overall for how it performs)

Total /100

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