Cascade Writing Contest

The 2016 OCW Cascade Writing Contest will open at 12:01 a.m. (PST) February 14, and the deadline will be 11:59 p.m. (PDT) March 31. Judges include top professionals in the field of Christian writing and publication. Awards will be presented during the annual OCW Summer Conference at the Red Lion on the River Hotel in Portland at 7:00 p.m., Wednesday, August 17.

You do not need to be an OCW member to enter. Contestants need not be present at the summer conference to win.

“Contests are a great way to get your work known and receive feedback from professionals. Finalists will have their work read by top Christian publishing house editors and agents.” Lindy Jacobs, OCW Summer Conference Director

The Cascade Writing Contest is for both published and unpublished writers and features a number of categories and genres. The purpose of the contest is to reward excellent writing and to encourage both seasoned and emerging writers as well as provide a notable achievement for a writer’s bio. 

About the Contest

Our carefully selected judges will receive score sheets for each entry to aid in scoring and to provide contestants with helpful feedback on their submissions. (You can see the score sheets here.)

Each category below will have a winner, and all the finalists will be featured in our summer conference notebook as Cascade Writing Contest finalists. Winners will be listed on the OCW website after the awards. 

The Awards

The Cascade Writing Contest is open in the following categories, with separate divisions for published and unpublished writers:

• Contemporary Fiction Book


• Historical Fiction Book
  


• Speculative Fiction Book
  


• Nonfiction Book
  


• Memoir Book
  


• Young Adult/Middle Grade Book,


• Fiction and Nonfiction
  Children’s: Chapter Book (ages 6–8) and Picture Book (ages 2–10+),


• Fiction and Nonfiction
  Poetry (a single poem)
  


• Devotional (a single devotional)
  


• Article, Column, Blog Post
  


• Short Story/Flash Fiction

Please carefully review the Contest Rules (for details about categories) and Scoring Elements before preparing your entry. You may review additional details by visiting the OCW website

The Judges

Our finals judges have been carefully selected from within the Christian writing industry. Preliminary judges include bookstore owners, writers, editors, teachers, librarians, pastors, and others interested in the written word.

The finals judges include:

Sally Apokedak (Les Stobbe Literary), Kim Bangs (Bethany/Chosen), Robyn Burwell (Harper Collins), Alice Crider (David C. Cook), Lonnie Hull DuPont (Revell, a division of Baker Books), Joanna Echols (Focus on the Family), Nick Harrison (WordServe Literary), Bill Jensen (William K Jensen Literary), Terri Kalfas (Grace Publishing), Susan King (The Upper Room), Sherri Langton (Bible Advocate), Chad McComas (The Christian Journal), Paul Smith (LIVE), Tamela Hancock Murray (The Steve Laube Agency), and Ben Wolf (Splickety Magazine).

2016 Timeline:

• February 14: Contest entry forms will be posted on the OCW website and submissions may begin. Contest is OPEN!


• March 31: Electronic submissions due or published book entries must be postmarked by this date.


• June 1: Finalists announced.


• August 17: Cascade Awards Ceremony, 7:00 p.m., during the OCW summer conference, at the Red Lion on the River Hotel in Portland.

Cascade Special Awards: We will also be presenting two honorary awards to OCW members at the Cascade Awards, the Trailblazer Award for a writer who has distinguished him/herself in the field of Christian writing, and the Writer of Promise Award for a new author who has shown unusual promise in the field of Christian writing.

“Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you” (Matthew 17:20 niv).