“I think that you kind of put everything into a first novel.” In this event hosted by the University of Notre Dame’s Creative Writing Program, Madeline Cash reads from her debut novel, Lost Lambs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2026), and talks about her range of influences, including artist Henry Darger and filmmaker Wes Anderson.
Find details about every creative writing competition—including poetry contests, short story competitions, essay contests, awards for novels, grants for translators, and more—that we’ve published in the Grants & Awards section of Poets & Writers Magazine during the past year. We carefully review the practices and policies of each contest before including it in the Writing Contests database, the most trusted resource for legitimate writing contests available anywhere.