If you have a short story about life in rural Australia waiting to be told, the Olga Masters Short Story Award is a wonderful opportunity to share your fiction with a wider audience and celebrate the craft of storytelling. Established in honour of acclaimed Australian writer Olga Masters, the award recognises outstanding short stories that capture the depth of human experience through strong characters, memorable settings and compelling narratives.
If you’d like to strengthen your technique before submitting, our Short Story Essentials course can help you learn the craft techniques needed to write engaging, polished and show-stopping short stories.
From the competition website:
2026 brings the exciting return of the Olga Masters Short Story Award. With the continued support of the Masters family, the Award is administered by South East Arts and delivered in partnership with South Coast Writers Centre.
The Award welcomes entries from writers of all ages residing in Australia. Entries must be a single story of 2000 to 4000 words, written in English, with the theme of life in rural Australia. Each entry will incur an entry fee of $25 AUD.
Entries open 28 July 2026 and will close at midnight on 16 August 2026. The Judges for 2026 will be announced soon.
Prizes
- First prize receives $1500 and publication
- Runner-up receives $500 and publication
- Supplementary prizes for all age groups may be offered at the discretion of the organisers.
All winning story/ies will be published on the Olga Masters Short Story Award (OMSSA) website.
Winners will be announced on Friday, 23 October at the 2026 Headland Writers Festival opening night in Tathra, NSW.
The judging process
Judging is completely anonymous.
The entrant’s name must not appear in the file name, header, footer or in the file’s title – only on the entry form – this ensures impartial judging of submissions.
The judges’ decision is final, and no correspondence will be entered into about the judgments or the judging process.
Whether you’re an emerging writer or an experienced storyteller, this competition is a chance to showcase your work and challenge your short fiction skills. Learn more and enter here.
