Welcome…

With a rich and diverse northern soul, the Cheshire Novel Prize is open to writers worldwide. We are all about giving un-agented writing talent a platform on which to make their writing mark wherever you live. In fact, four of our listed writers in the last two years live overseas.

The prize is now nearly four years old and over the last three years, fifteen of our shortlisted writers and 30 of our long-listed writers have received offers of representation as a direct result of entering the prize. Many other listed writers have received interest in their work—and representation in some cases— as a direct result of our agent showcase. Other writers have used our feedback to successfully become published with independent presses or smaller publishing houses or agented.

Cheshire Novel Prize (CNP) was created by Sara Cox (@saranaidinecox ), writer and editor. Sara was awarded an MA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University (@McrWritingSchl ).

Sara understands that writing can be a long and arduous road, where the slush pile and querying can seem insurmountable for even the most talented of writers.

Passionate about writing and new writers, CNP is Sara’s way of offering new unagented talent the chance to rise up and allow their voices to be heard and their stories told.

The Cheshire Novel Prize accepts all genres including memoir, fictional memoir and YA. We do not accept Children’s novels but we do have a separate children’s prize which runs from September to December each year.

What’s different about us?

We believe that entering any novel prize or competition can be daunting. Putting your work out there is never an easy decision. That’s why we believe for the cost of our entry fee of £29.00 EVERY writer should receive at least a page of feedback as to why they were not long-listed or shortlisted. Having that feedback can really help writers to realise that not only is reading subjective, but sometimes the reasons for not being long-listed have nothing to do with the quality of the work or the ability of the writer. That is why the Cheshire Novel Prize will provide feedback for every single entry. Please note we offer some personalised feedback but generic feedback is also part of the feedback given.

The Cheshire Novel Prize is open to un-agented, unpublished or unagented self-published novelists only.

Submission Process

We ask you for the first 5,000 words of your work plus a 500 word synopsis. If you are long-listed, we then ask for an additional 20,000 words and if shortlisted, we ask you to send us the whole manuscript. We believe these timelines give you additional time from the point of entry to the long-list and the shortlist judging.