The Theme, Date & New Venue for our Special 30th Event
Submissions open on 10 August for our Special 30th event on Sunday 9 November 2025. The theme is is BEAUTY/BEAUTIFUL.
NB Please remember that we are looking for STORIES, something with a 'narrative arc' to read to a live audience.
The working title of the event is All This Useless Beauty based on the 1996 Elvis Costello song and the 1926 Maupassant short story.
As always it's free to submit.
OUR NEW VENUE is the Lansdown Hall in Stroud and the event will be part of the 2025 Stroud Book Festival. The Cotswold Playhouse was unable to offer us any dates that would allow us to be part of the Book Festival. Like the Playhouse, the Lansdown Hall has a seating capacity of 150.
KEY DATES - Submissions will open on Sunday 10 August and close on Sunday 21 September. The results will be announced on Wednesday 1 October and tickets will go on sale on Friday 3 October from the Lansdown Hall website. If you're interested, please make a note of these dates.
We choose ten stories to be read/performed by their authors. We take both unpublished and previously published stories of 500 to 1500 words. Under our legendary Rule 11 (now 12!), the authors who read on keep on Movin' event on Sunday 11 May are unable to submit to this event.
I will be co-judging this time with short story author and novelist Ali Bacon who has read a number of times at SSS and won awards for her short fiction. Ali's novel The Absent Heart was published in March this year.
Link to info about the JUDGES is here.
Link to the Rules and How to Submit is here.
Link to Tips on Writing for SSS is here. This is essential reading!
John