The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2024 is a £5,000 international writing prize for unagented emerging writers who may be unpublished, self-published or independently published.

We are looking for novels for children or teens, chapter books and picture book texts. Initial submissions are the opening 5,000 words plus one page synopsis of children’s novels, chapter books, and YA novels, or up to three picture book texts with summaries.

The author of 2024’s winning manuscript will receive £5,000. The winner will also receive the beautiful Minerva trophy, based on the world famous sculpture in Bath’s Roman Baths.

All listees win feedback worth £180 on their opening pages from an editorial director at Cornerstones Literary Consultancy. Shortlisted writers also win a compilation of award readers’ comments on their full manuscript. .

One longlisted writer will also win a place worth £1,980 on the 18 week virtual course Edit Your Novel the Professional Way from Cornerstones Literary Consultancy and the Professional Writing Academy.

Entry is £29.99 per submission with sponsored places available for writers on a low income.

Previous prize recipients include: Struan Murray for the manuscript of Orphans of the Tide (published by Puffin in 2020); Lucy Van Smit for the manuscript of The Hurting (Chickenhouse, 2018) and Matthew Fox for the manuscript of The Sky Over Rebecca (Hachette, 2022).

We are keen to encourage quality, so suggest writers to check their stories before submitting using Prowritingaid. They have free and paid versions and are the best writing software we know to help improve grammar, readability and check for repetition, ‘sticky’ sentences and suggest alternatives.