The Results Are in!
We received hundreds of entries from horse lovers around the country and beyond, and narrowing the field down to just ten finalists was no easy task. Thank you to everyone who participated in our inaugural fiction contest, and congratulations to the winning writers!
Grand Prize:
Let’s Fly
By Jennifer Bissett
Runners-up:
Free Spirit
By Clarissa Chipman
Toby’s Meadow
By Greg Huddleston
To Fly without Wings
By Dana Kerkentzes
Just to Finish
By Kerry Lowrey
I Do What I Do
By Jess Paquette
Hopelessly Horse-Crazy
By Deborah Penn
Echoes of Sunrise
By Chelsea Schmidt
Waiting for Sally
By Mariamne Shin
Miracle Mare
By Mollie Trainum
The horseillustrated.com editors selected ten finalists to be judged by equine author Michele Scott. The grand prize winner receives a $100 Amazon.com gift card and will have her story published in an upcoming issue of Horse Illustrated!
The ten finalists each receive an autographed copy of Michele Scott’s new novel, Silent Harmony.
Back to all horse contests >>
This is a great idea! you guys should do things like this more often!!
What a great idea.
too bad I am no good at writing,
Cool! I can’t wait to read the stories people write!
What a great way to start getting kids/people interested in being an author.
COOL 🙂
interesting contest and creative
cool! what a great opportunity!
I’ve never herd of this book. If i don’t win it, i’ll buy it myself!
Just read the blurb, this sounds intriguing and challenging.
Cool! I LOVE writing! This sounds like a great opportunity! I hope I win!
Can it be the beginning of a book im writing because just writing a story is kinda hard but maybe a lead or something to my book? like the first chapter or less
Wow! this is so cool! Being a book writer myself, I am going to enter my book, but make it into a short story. 🙂 I’ve never seen Silent Harmony, but it looks great! I will buy it if I don’t win.
This is awesome! I’m not that great of a short story writer, but I’ve seen so many great horse books I want on amazon, I’m going to give it a try.
Awesome! I’m gonna try! 🙂
Can it be realistic fiction?
I am going to join but when is the do date
Hhmm…seems fun! I love to write, so I guess this is right up my alley…not sure about the word limit, though. Wonder how well I’ll do with that!
Good luck, everyone! Happy writing!
Well why not let’s see what I can come up with 🙂
I have just submitted my story:)
I emailed my story. I hope y’all are entertained!
Am submitting now! 😉
Interesting! I hope that everyone’s weekend is both great and safe,plus I also hope that they are having a nice Flag Day and have a happy Father’s Day. That goes for last year and all the othr years that I’ve missed. Good luck to the contestants!
mmmmm me pondre a hacer algunos ensayos
tengo miles de historias que puedo compartir ‘
el problema es que no soy escritor ejejej
saludos
I really like writing, but whatever I write never seems quite good enough. 🙂
How many entries per person? This is so exciting!
Oh no! I just saw this and now there’s only ten days left!!!
i can’t do it, i wrote my short story and i can’t fit it all into 1500, i’m a novel writer i can’t write short stories!!!!:( and there no way i can come up with another idea and hope that i can fit it all in without sounding vague.:( no amazon card for me…
Done! I really enjoyed writing it.
Also, here is a qoute for you people who say you can’t do it:
“One is not a true writer until one can overcome all the styles of writing, be it first, second, or third person, short stories, summaries, or novels. If one is a true writer, the love of writing will prevail over any challenges thrown in one’s way.”
Which is to say, if you love writing enough you will be able to write in any format or style, no matter how bad it is. 🙂
Wish I could write, my stories would not be very interesting.
zlooking forward to reading everyone else’s stories.
cool
good luck to all that are entering interesting contest hope there is more in the future
f
The email address won’t work!? 🙁
Wow. I finally finished and there is only one day left! I write longer pieces, like novels, and doing a short story in 1500 words was complicated. But I enjoyed it!
Good luck to everyone, and I really look forward to reading them!
Phew, I just made it!
Is 500 words like, short? lol:)
I wish it could be more than 1,500 words! It’s so hard to go into as little detail as possible to try and fit some things in, because horses and just so beautiful and to capture their beauty in mere words, you need lots of detail! If whoever decided to host this decided to do it again, please allow more words!
Anyways, I just finished mine now, at 11:25 pm , the 29th of June (LOL)
I cut that close. Set the story by email, hope it went through.
It is definitely hard to figure out a way to tell a story, especially pacing wise, in 1,500 words. I’m used to chapter writing as well.
Just sent mine in! Talk about last minute, but I wasn’t quite done tweaking. Had to send it off before I started picking at it too much, lol.
I just spent a long time writing this story and now the email address won’t work…is the deadline past due already? It’s 8:32 PM on June 30th.
Just submitted my entry. If you cant tell I am a last minute type of person. 😛
I hope they’ll accept stories submitted before midnight in different time zones. 🙂
Thank you so much for sponsoring a contest like this! Can’t wait to read the winning story!
When will the winner/finalists be named? So excited to see the winning story!
Got the July issue and saw the ad for the contest on the back. Thought it would be cool to enter. Didn’t know the contest was over June 30th……so why was the ad in the July magazine?
I hope you’ll post the winners on here somewhere. I think everyone would like to know!
I am really dissapointed in Horse Illustrated. I saw the ad in the July issue and was so looking forward to the possibility of having my work published. And now the deadline was June 30th… That’s really not friendly!!!! I am fourteen years old and that completly killed my interest in Horse Illustrated.
Wow, this just sucks!!!! How can you put an ad for a contest in a July magazine if the deadline was June 30th?! I am likewise very dissapointed and 14 years old
Wow, I am bummed. I was looking forward to entering my story into the contest, but it’s really not fair that the add for it came out in the July issue! But whatever, I’ll live.
I sent in my story but haven’t heard anything. 🙁 I would like to see a list of winners though!
Have the winners been notified yet? If not, when will they be? What issue will the winning story be published in? Excited to see who won, and of course I hope it’s me 🙂
How can you have a contest, when the deadline is before the ad was published? My wife has been working very hard on a story to submit, and when she finished it, was very disappointed to find out she was too late. It is so unfair to get one’s hopes up to no avail. Nothing in the ad for the contest mentioned a deadline. She is a faithful subscriber and you do this? A slap in the face, Phil Parent (Supportive husband)
Phil, your righteous anger may be misplaced, for I, too, worked on a story for this contest, but I clicked on this same web page days before the contest ended and the deadline was very clear. It was featured on the horsechannel.com home page for quite a while when the contest opened, too.
I hope your wife credits you for your protectiveness, though.
I agree with CB. It’s an unfortunate thing that there were people who missed the deadline for this, but I also only saw it in the July issue, but checked it out online and saw the deadline. I’m grateful that I was able to get a story in on time, but sorry that others missed out. Hopefully this contest goes over well and they’ll hold one again in the future! Hope to see the winners list soon!
I think this is a GREAT idea to have this type of equine-inspired-story writing contest! I was disappointed however, when I came online to see the deadline for this contest advertised in the July issue, which I had just picked up to read from the library, as being closed June 30.
So July magazine advertising an awesome writing contest, but that has the deadline the last day of the previous month, June 30.
Would love to see this opportunity again! Just with closer attention to detail of contest deadline not having happened before the month of the magazine it it still being advertised within! Thanks, Jeanne
Has anyone seen a list of winners yet?
I haven’t heard anything yet, Clair. Still waiting for results here.
Um its been over a month and a half, where is the results???
I’m with Holland. Any news would be welcomed. List of winners, announce the issue that the winning story will be in, etc. Please?
Based on when other HorseChannel.com contests ended compared to when results were displayed, I estimated the results would be posted around Sept. 30. But since t the next contest in line to display the results, hopefully it will be sooner! 🙂 I’m trying to wait patiently, but it’s difficult. It’s unfortunate it takes them this long to judge.
This contest has been skipped on the results list. The HI 2013 Photo Contest was the same way, but the results for that is in the September HI issue. There’s no word on this one, which is making the wait all the more difficult. I don’t think the judging would be taking THIS long, but I don’t know what else they might be waiting on either.
Erin has a good point. They might show it in the next Horse Illustrated Issue, like they did in the September issue for the 2013 HI photo Contest!
Hi, everyone. Thanks for your patience with the results. The finalists have been selected and the judge is currently working on choosing the overall winner. As soon as we have her selection, we’ll notify the winner and the finalists by email and post the winning stories.
Awesome news! Thank you for the update!
Yay! This is very exciting 🙂
Anyone heard anything? Paged through the digital October 2013 issue of HI and didn’t see anything.
I don’t think narrowing down to the finalists story would take that long! Will this be posted on the next Horse Illustrated November Issue? Or online, or both?
I just got an email from them! Won the book 🙂 Sept 19th, 2:00pm Central Time
Great job, everybody! 🙂
And I tried so hard… 🙁 but congrats to winners…
Not going to lie, I am a little crushed, but congrats to the winners! There’s always next time, hopefully they do this contest again next year!
Wow! I wish I would have entered. I even had the story idea!
cool
I have to admit that I’m sorry I wasn’t picked but then again, who do I think I am? 🙂
Congratulations to the winners. I’ll be back to read each story.
Congratulations to everyone that won! I really hoped that my story (story: “Don’t Give Up”) would’ve won, as I have never ever won a story contest in my life, so if I did win it would’ve made a big change in my life.
A lot of great young talent. I hope they all continue writing stories.
I would love to read some of these short stories. Really, everyone is a winner, because they all wrote great memories.
talented writers
I really wanted to win… but I have to admit, Let’s fly is a lot better than mine. Congratulations to all the winners!
Wow those stories are so good! I was hoping to make it into the top ten, but the authors of these stories are wonderful! Well done!! You are so talented!
Congratulations to the winners! Sad that I didn’t place, but it was fun to participate! 🙂
I love writing and it was very interesting reading all these well-written stories!!
I think my favorite was miracle mare, I also volunteer at a therapeutic riding stables called Exceptional Equestrian of Missouri Valley, and can relate tho the feelings, never had something that big happen, but smaller accomplishments, a rider attempting two point even thinner was really nervous etc
I loved reading Jennifer’s story, Let’s Fly. It touched my heart, very well written and a delight to read!!!
What beautiful artistry! Portraits painted with words. I was curious regarding the inspiration of the various authors. My entry was based on the life-long love between my mother and Toby. She always spoke in such endearing terms of their relationship. Horses had such importance to rural Missourians during the early and middle part of last century, becoming beloved and celebrated members of the family. I enjoyed each story very much and am joyous to discover the art of writing and storytelling represented so well here. Thank you HorseChannel!
Fellow finalists…did any of you receive your book yet? I am worried it had fallen prey to package theft as I am missing another package I was expecting from Amazon as well. 🙁
Dana, no book yet as of this morning. But I do have a brand new box of crayons in anticipation of next year’s HorseChannel Short Story Fiction contest! *smile* So I am ready! (I do believe I write better in blue.)
It’s been so lovely to read so many kind comments about all of the stories! I’m truly honored to have won the contest, and I LOVED reading all of the stories by the finalists. Thank you again Horse Illustrated, HorseChannel.com and Michele Scott for giving us a place to share our stories! You’ll never know how much this has meant to me.
SALUDOS
Is there going to be another fiction writing contest?