2025 High Country Words Writing Competition

We’re excited to announce that the Mansfield Readers & Writers and Bushy Tales writing competitions have joined forces to become High Country Words! 

Bushy Tales is an annual writers competition that has run in Mansfield for 10 years. It featured prizes for short story, memoir, poetry and bush poetry, culminating in an awards night and a Bushy Tales anthology of its own. Mansfield Readers & Writers Short Story Competition has been held twice, and has produced the beautiful Heart and Soul Anthologies.

Starting in 2025, both competitions will run under the banner High Country Words Competition, with categories for short story, poetry and bush poetry.

The theme for 2025 is “SCRUB”.

There are three categories:

  • Short story: 2000 words maximum, prizes $1000 open and $500 local
  • Poetry: 100 lines maximum, prize $500
  • Bush poetry: 100 lines maximum, prize $500

We are thrilled to announce our fabulous judges:

  • Short Story: Margaret Hickey – award-winning author and playwright from North East Victoria with a PhD in Creative Writing. Author of Cutters EndStone TownBroken Bay, The Creeper, and short story collection Rural Dreams.
  • Poetry: Maria Takolander – fiction writer, poet, essayist, independent scholar, public artist, reviewer, and interviewer, author of the short story collection The Double (Text Publishing 2013), and a poetry collection Trigger Warning (UQP 2021).
  • Bush Poetry: Andrew and Frederica Furphy – these Shepparton raconteurs aim to keep bush themed story-telling alive with the benefit of age, a love of the well chosen word, and interest in regional Australia.

The entry fee is $20 for an initial entry with $10 each for further entries.
Local/student/pensioner entry fee $10 .
Arts Mansfield members and Mansfield Readers & Writers members get one free entry.

Important Dates

Entries open 1st February 2025 and close 30th April 2025.

Longlist announced mid-June 2025.

Shortlist announced late July 2025.

The winner announced August 2025 (date to be finalized).

The anthology will launch at the Mansfield Readers & Writers Festival October 2025.

High Country Words Competition Entry Form

2025 High Country Words competition

Mansfield Readers and Writers national writing competition, High Country Words.

Please provide a sentence or two that describes how your story relates to the theme. The link can be as strong or as simple as you like.
This will tell us if you are eligible for the local writers prize!

Contact details

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Upload your story

Before you upload… please check that your story is formatted in 12 point font, 1.5 line spacing, wide margins AND does not have your name appearing on any of the pages. Thank you.
Accepted file types: docx, doc, rtf, Max. file size: 1 MB.
If you’re unable to upload your story, please email it to us at mansfieldreadersandwriters@gmail.com Include your name and the name of your story in the body of your email.

Entry fee

Please make payment of your $20 entry fee by bank transfer

Account Name: Mansfield Readers and Writers Inc.
BSB: 633000
Account Number: 194524070
Reference/description: Include reference SCRUB and your first initial and family name.

Members of Mansfield Readers and Writers Inc can submit one entry for free. Interested in becoming a member? Visit the membership page on our website.

Competition guidelines

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Check below to confirm you have read and understood the competition guidelines and agree to abide by them. https://mansfieldreadersandwriters.com/writing-competition/
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