Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival Short Fiction Story Contest 2025 ($1,750 cash prize) Deadline: 1 July, 2025

Applications are open for the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival Short Fiction Story Contest 2025. The BCLF Short Fiction Story Contest is an annual writing competition geared towards unearthing and encouraging the distinctive voice and story of the Caribbean-descended writer and expanding the creative writing landscape of Caribbean literature.

Started in 2019 as the Emergent Writers Contest for unpublished writers with the organization’s maiden voyage into the literary world, its primary mission was to unearth the hidden storytellers of Caribbean descent in the North American diaspora by serving as encouragement and incentive for them to write their stories. That prize was called the BCLF Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writer’s Prize. Flummoxed by entries from writers in the region, in 2020, the competition was renamed the BCLF Short Fiction Story Contest and a second prize appeared, specifically targeted to writers in the Caribbean. The regional prize, unlike the diaspora one was opened to writers of all levels with the distinctive eligibility clause of residency in the Caribbean.

Benefits

• A US$1,750 cash prize
• BCLF Trophy
• A caché of books courtesy Akashic Books
• A feature episode on the acclaimed BCLF Cocoapod
• Author interview and profile on the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival website
• BCLF branded merchandise
• Winner will be published in PREE Literary Magazine
• Winner will be published in Carib News

Eligibility

For the BCLF Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writer’s Prize:

• All entrants must be of Caribbean heritage/of Caribbean descent;
• Be a resident of the United States/Canada;
• Be over the age of 18 years;
• Self-published writers may apply.

For the BCLF Elizabeth Nunez Award for Writers in the Caribbean:

• Exclusively open to unpublished and published writers who were born/raised and holding nationality in the Caribbean;
• You may submit if you are currently on temporary assignment elsewhere in the world (except the US and Canada);
• Submitted stories must be original works of fiction;
• Be over the age of 18 years;
• All writers regardless of their publishing status may apply.

Deadline: July 1, 2025

Application

• For the Award for Writers in the Caribbean: Apply here!
• For the Caribbean-American Writer’s Prize: Apply here!

For more information, visit BCLF Short Fiction Story Contest.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE & APPLY