NorthBound Book Award eligibility - Northern Writers Awards

Eligibility criteria

Northbound Book Award 2020

We accept fiction and narrative non-fiction for this award. Our mission is to support writing of exceptional literary merit. To be eligible for this award your manuscript must be complete at the time of application.

We accept fiction from any genre, including literary fiction, crime, science fiction, romance and fantasy. You may submit novels, novellas and collections of short stories, but not individual short stories.

New, emerging and established writers may enter for this award. If your work is at an earlier stage of development you should enter one of our other awards strands. We do not accept poetry, children’s writing or young adult novels for this award. Children’s writers should enter the Hachette Children’s Novel Award. Young Adult writers should explore our awards strands for the most appropriate outlet. Poets should enter either the New North Poets Award or the Northern Writers’ Award for Poetry.

Narrative non-fiction is eligible. This has stylistic and structural similarities to fiction but deals instead with factual or mostly factual subject matter. Work that fits in this category includes biography, memoir, nature writing and non-fiction with a strong literary intent. Works of factual, technical, journalistic and scientific writing, local history, travel writing, translation or self-publishing projects are not eligible for entry.

You must be over the age of 18 to enter.

The award is open to submissions of work written in World English by writers of any nationality or descent who at the time of entering are permanently resident in the North of England.

Writers must currently live full-time in the North of England. The North of England is defined as the areas covered by Arts Council England in Yorkshire, North East and North West. We regret we are unable to accept submissions from outside these areas due to conditions in our funding from Arts Council England.

Previous winners of the Northern Writers’ Awards may enter for this award.

To be considered, work does not have to be of a ‘northern’ flavour or have a ‘northern’ theme. Writers who are writing books set in the North of England but who do not live in the region are not eligible.

All entries must be made through the online submissions portal. To qualify, a submission must consist of two items: the online application form and the creative work.

You are not eligible to enter if the work is currently part of a book deal that you have received a publishing contract and advance for. If you receive a book deal for the work during the judging period it is your responsibility to inform us of this fact.

New Writing North and Saraband will make final decisions on eligibility. Our decisions will be final and no communication will be entered into on the subject.

Employees of Saraband may not enter for this award.

To be eligible submissions to the awards must have been made by 11.59PM on 6 February 2020. Submissions received after this point in time will not be eligible for entry.

Conditions of entry

All submissions to the awards must be made via the awards website.

Incomplete submissions will not be considered or acknowledged.

Writers entering the TV Awards may enter both strands (TV Drama and Serial Drama).

Writers entering all other awards may only enter for one award each year, with one exception: they may also enter for a TLC Free Read. Please browse the criteria for each of the awards before choosing the one that is the best fit for your needs, age, gender and aspirations.

The work that you enter must be your own original work.

All submissions must be written by a single author.

If you win an award you will be asked to prove your place of residence and identity.

Entrants must be over the age of 18 for all of the Northern Writers’ Awards except for the Young Northern Writer Award and the Matthew Hale Award (which are for young people aged 12-18 years old).

Undergraduate and postgraduate students may enter awards if they are permanently based in the North of England. We would advise students consider their current commitments before applying to certain awards, primarily those that include placements or mentoring.

New Writing North withholds the right to withdraw and reclaim the financial value of an award if it is discovered that a writer has fabricated any information in their submission.

The awards are not open to employees and trustees of New Writing North or of our major supporters, Arts Council England and Northumbria University.

To qualify, a submission must consist of two items: the online application form and the creative work in progress.

Submissions received after the deadline will not be eligible for entry.

The judges’ decision is final and no correspondence or discussion about the judging process will be entered into.

Winning writers must be available to participate in the prize ceremony in Newcastle upon Tyne. Winning authors will be expected to resource their own travel and accommodation costs in relation to attending the event. Winners who are under the age of 18 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.

Not all winning writers will be invited to the Summer Talent Party in London. Those who are invited will be expected to resource their own travel and accommodation costs in relation to attending the event.

We reserve the right to withdraw an award if the author is not available to come to the event.

All winning authors must be available to participate in media and PR for the award around the time of the awards ceremony and related events.

We reserve the right to vary the rules and conditions of entry and to make any amendments to the published schedule as are deemed necessary.

Work that has already being self-published is not eligible for entry to the awards. All work entered must be unpublished.

It is your responsibility to ensure that your submission is eligible for the prize.

By entering your work for the awards you are confirming to us that the work that you are submitting is your own original work, and that you have read and agree to the Conditions of Entry of the awards.

We reserve the right to vary the rules and conditions of entry and to make any amendments to the published schedule as are deemed necessary.

We will write to everyone who entered for an award and inform them of the outcome of their application once the judging process has concluded.

We apologise in advance that we are unable to enter into individual correspondence with writers about submissions that do not win awards or to give specific feedback on every submission that is made. This is due to the exceptionally large amount of entries that we have to process as part of the awards.

We intend that entering your work for the awards is an accessible process. If you are unclear about any aspect of the submission process please read our Frequently Asked Questions here. If your query can’t be answered this way please email us at awards@newwritingnorth.com. We will endeavour to reply to your email in good time.