Welcome To Our Third Annual Writing Contest
Why do we host a writing contest every year for women? We want you to know about this path of self-development and growth, called the Heroine’s Journey. We want you to see that you are definitely on this path and recognize that you are a Heroine! As strong advocates of using the Heroine’s Journey path as a model of personal evolution, which we call Your Epic Journey of Transformation, we support it as a tool for building confidence, self-esteem and ultimately, positively affecting our world, one Heroine at a time.
The Benefits To Telling Your Story
What better way for you to realize these things than to ask you to tell a story using the Journey milestones. This contest asks you to take a story from your life, from a time when you overcame your internal and external obstacles and prevailed – and to tell that personal story within this ancient story framework - the Heroine’s Journey.
Doing this will raise your awareness. The Heroine’s Journey is essentially a journey of identity. You won’t be able to see yourself as ordinary anymore once you’ve seen how your life story matches the milestones of the Heroine’s Journey!
Let's Get Started
Please submit an entry. Here’s how to do it and the information that you’ll want to know:
Step 1: Sign up for the contest. (link below)
Step 2: Review the criteria (see below) to be sure you know what the requirements are and then start writing!
Step 3: Submit your entry to [email protected] by November 1, 2025 at 12:01 am.
Step 4: The winners will be revealed on December 11th!
Requirements
Eligibility
The Heroine’s Writing Contest is open to women, whether published or not, regardless of experience. Previously published stories in other contests, books, magazines, etc. are not accepted. Submissions are welcome if they are original to the contest entrant and meet the following guidelines. (One submission per contest entry.)
Format
Entries will be identified by the author’s name, which should appear in the upper right hand corner of each page.
- All multi-page entries must be titled and paginated.
- All entries must have one-inch margins and page numbers.
- Your story must be double-spaced.
- Poems are accepted and may be spaced and arranged according to the poet’s intent.
- All entries must be submitted in Microsoft Word file (.doc or .docx) or a .PDF file (.pdf). When format is an integral part of the work’s aesthetic effect, a scanned image converted to a PDF document is acceptable.
*** Most importantly, the Heroine’s Writing Contest entries must be written using the common structural elements of the heroine’s/ hero’s journey which are found universally in myths, fairy tales, stories and movies. Joseph Campbell brought the term “hero’s journey” into popular use. He used it to represent either men or women. My work is about empowering women to accept that they are true heroines on a transformational journey. I use the term “heroine’s journey”. The contest entries will be your personal stories written within the general structure of the Hero/Heroine's Journey framework.
Click here to read more about this framework.
Contestants will email their stories with double line spacing, within a maximum of (3) pages (750 words). All entries must be original works. All stories have to be about the author submitting, not about someone else.
How will the contest be judged?
Our four judges will read your work according to the following – criteria are weighted accordingly:
- The story effectively relates to the theme of the contest (it should touch on at least three Heroine’s Journey milestones): 40%
- Character development is clear: 30% (the goal of the journey is to transform the heroine)
- Creativity: 30%
Stipulations:
- All entrants retain the copyright to their submissions; however, we would like to share your stories with our online community. We ask contest participants to grant weHeroines the right to reproduce any submission on its website or blog.
Prizes:
- We will select a first, second, third place, as well as an honorable mention.
- First place will receive a cash prize of $500
- Second place will receive a cash prize of $300
- Third place will receive a cash prize of $200
- The Honorable Mention will receive a cash prize of $100
The Heroine’s Writing Contest
Have you ever felt a story brewing inside you, waiting to be shared? This is your moment to shine! Our writing contest is back, inviting you to embrace your inner heroine and pen your unique story. It's time to celebrate the everyday triumphs, the quiet acts of courage, and the unwavering spirit of women everywhere. Enter today and let your voice be heard! You might even win $500.00!
Sign up now and receive writing guidance, inspiration, and deadline alerts.
Contest opens July 31st.
All entries must be in by November 12:01 am.
Read More About The Writing Contest
The Heroine’s Writing Contest is open to everyone whether published or not, regardless of experience. Previously published stories in other contests, books, magazines, etc. are accepted and welcome as long as they are original to the contest entrant and meet these guidelines.
Click Here
Meet Our 2024 Contest Winners
We’re proud to share the powerful stories from last year’s contest. Each of our four winners had the courage to put their journey into words, and we published their pieces as blogs for our community to read and celebrate. Their stories remind us of the strength, creativity, and heart that shines when women say yes to their voice.
First Place Winner Carolyn Delaney
Carolyn Delaney shares how leaving a successful tech career to start Journey magazine—rooted in her own recovery story—became a leap of courage, community, and purpose that continues to spread hope and change lives.
Second Place Winner Shondra Jin Robbins
At seventeen, in the depths of depression and suicidal thoughts, Shondra Jin Robbins made a life-saving pact with herself never to end her life—a promise that carried her through years of struggle, taught her resilience, and ultimately allowed her to guide the next generation with hard-won strength.
Third Place Winner: Laura Moseley
After surviving years of abuse, she found the strength to leave, transform her pain into purpose, and become her own hero—now fighting for others through advocacy, writing, and truth-telling.
Honorable Mention Liz Starr
Elizabeth Starr shares how she left behind an abusive relationship, reclaimed her freedom, and discovered her true voice and purpose through art and creative living.
Meet Our Judges
Phyllis Blackstone
Phyllis Blackstone, storyteller extraordinaire, is a retired education and education professor. Storytelling is her preferred teaching tool from first graders to graduate students. She relates folktales, personal stories and creative fiction with an engaging style that charms audiences of children, adults, families, and senior. She enjoys sharing stories of wisdom and truth in churches, schools, libraries, retirement homes and organizations.
My Storied Life: A Maine storyteller shares tales of her family, travels in her motor home, experiences in the classroom, and musings on life Kindle Edition
Listen in...
...as professional storyteller Phyllis Blackstone shares stories about her family, career, musings and life. These heartwarming tales provide a breath of fresh air that offers comfort and stimulates our own reflections, while the universal truths they convey encourage further exploration through discussion with others.
You’ll find yourself laughing one minute and crying the next as you enjoy Blackstone’s gift as an observer and communicator of the human condition in all its beauty, foibles and sadness.
Join this master storyteller as she shares tales that will amuse you, inspire you, connect you to shared experiences, and challenge you to consider how your life has meaning beyond your own understanding.
Kim Kallicky
I'm young enough to still believe in magic.
I'm old enough to value every single day.
Every single encounter.
Every gorgeous sunset that gives way to full moons.
I will forever feel blessed to have lived in New England,
in Maine,
with our oceans and mountains and seasons.
Quiet. Colors. Ebbs. Flows.
Escape with me amidst the beauty that is Maine.
EVENTIDE
Eventide is an archaic word meaning evening.
Three couples hadn’t been out for an overnight on the boat together since their twenties. Now middle-aged, with adult children, and the baggage that ebbs and flows during a life lived that long, they set out toward Monhegan Island, Maine from Portland, full of joy, telling stories of back-in-the-day, listening to 80’s music.
But over the course of the day, their burdens begin to seep out – a child who is addicted to drugs, possibly a fault of the father’s. A son home from Afghanistan with anger issues and one leg. A senior-in-college daughter who has no desire for a job, just like her mother.
Exploring Monhegan Island, conversations (and drinks) continue to flow as the afternoon wanes. By evening, it all falls apart.
Back on the boat brings rain and an accident and then an opportunity taken. Collusion in murder.....can it ever work?
Click to buy Eventide on Amazon
And to see Kim’s other books.
Click to buy Away at a Camp in Maine at Amazon
Click to buy Mothers Fulfilled at Amazon
Kim has also written articles for:
Margaret Jones
Margaret Jones, M.Ed has a background in social work and education with a certificate in therapeutic storytelling. For over thirty years she worked in nonprofits as a counselor, public speaker and grant writer.
With funding from the State of Maine, she developed Storytelling with Heart, a curriculum for professionals to create and use stories in their work with clients and/or communities. She traveled nationally with her curriculum, developed a CD and published several articles on storytelling.
In 2003, she received an award from the National Storytelling Association for her contribution to the field of therapeutic storytelling.
Margaret’s love for the Tarot grew out of her love for stories and undeniable curiosity in all things mystical. In 1982, she began her studies with Rachel Pollock, Mary Greer and Caitlin and John Matthews. She continues to be part of a peer support group of Tarot readers and offers readings to those who wish to be guided by the intuitive power of the cards.
At the age of nineteen, Margaret began her travels abroad in search of her Welsh grandmother’s birthplace. That journey ignited her desire to visit sacred sites and encouraged her to search for stories that lay in the landscape. She now leads small groups on guided tours to sacred sites and shares the stories of the region.
In her spare time, Margaret performs, writes travel essays, and continues her research on mythic stories.
Walking Sacred Sites: Listening to their Stories
by Margaret W. Jones; Published by Maine Authors Publishing
As a travel guide and storyteller, Margaret invites us into her world. She transports us to places she has visited, from her search for ancestral sites in Wales and Scotland to sacred sites in England, Ireland and Jordan. She walks the land, listens deeply and hears the story as well as feels the ancestors’ presence. With compelling detail, Margaret narrates a lesser- known history of these sacred places by touching stones, kneeling before holy wells and sensing the more invisible forces around her. She hears the whispers of the ancestors who once lived there and weaves magic into their deeper stories.
Kathy Swaar
This is the page where I'm supposed to talk about myself. Not sure what you may or may not want to know about me, I wasn’t sure exactly what to say. So, I took the 'buckshot approach,' and included a little bit of everything. The serious, professional details are here:
Trained and commissioned as a Lay Pastor (now referred to as Commissioned Ruling Elder) in the Presbyterian Church (USA), I served congregations in central Illinois and the larger church from 1989-2014. From 1996-2014, I had the honor of pastoring Knox Presbyterian Church in Springfield, IL. My service to the larger church included serving on the presbytery's Committee on Preparation for Ministry, a term as Council Chair, as the Dean of Great Rivers Presbytery's second Lay Pastor Training Academy, and as Co-Moderator of the Church Orders and Ministry Committee at the 213th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, (USA).
I received a Master of Arts Degree in Child, Family, and Community Services (a social work-style program) in 1992 from the University of Illinois at Springfield. An adjunct assistant professor at UIS from 1992-2002, I taught basic communications and helping skills courses for the Criminal Justice program.
As President and CEO of W-K Swaar Enterprises, Inc., I currently oversee the management of our family's farming operation in Central Illinois.
Now a full-time writer, author, and blogger, I’m at home in central Illinois just a short drive from the farm after a brief sojourn in the tropical south.
But there's also this...
Retired pastor, retired teacher, frustrated writer, struggling quilter, amateur genealogist, sports junkie, corporate CEO. Most days are spent writing, reading, sewing, ripping, digging up dead relatives, watching football, and/or searching for antique glassware, with occasional forays into marketing and bookkeeping, and minute-by-minute management of my Pepperidge Farm Goldfish habit.
It happens. One minute everything is fine; the next it is not.Mirroring the twists and turns of the labyrinth— many of which are 180-degree U-turns—intimate loss changes everything. Roles that previously ordered life and defined existence no longer apply. It is necessary to discern all over again who you are and where you fit in the world. While loss is part of life, it is experienced uniquely. There is no one right way to grieve, or any specific time line; each of us must find our own way.In Fine Lines: Walking the Labyrinth of Grief and Loss, Kathy Swaar uses personal narrative, pastoral reflection, and prayer to create a space in which to do that. Companioning you through the fine lines, the ins and outs, the twists and turns of grief and loss, she offers permission to name and face what is, and invites you to make connections along the way: to yourself, to others, and to the Holy.
A sweeping nineteenth-century tale taking readers from the Old World to the New, from Prussia to New Orleans to the Illinois Prairie, Sophie poses questions of identity and belonging all of us wrestle with. Even though it is a work of historical fiction, Sophie’s story—her experiences of love and loss, triumph and adversity, joy and sorrow, and how she makes her way through them—is our story too.
