For our 2025 annual Creative Writing Competition, MK Lit Fest adopted the theme of Home. 

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Home can be a literal thing - a personal address, the renting or ownership of which makes it more than just a place to live. It might be a castle, a terraced house, or a tent in the woods. Home can be something you make or remake, and equally something that you leave or lose (whether willingly or otherwise). A 'home' can be somewhere you are put, for a variety of reasons, or a place where you were raised: homes can be literal as well as metaphorical institutions. It can be about family and heritage, or - whether by accident or design - something more individual.

Home can be a source of comfort, pride and love, or it can be a source of suffering, conflict and pain. Home can mean somewhere you feel a sense of belonging, or it can be where you are aware that you don't. It can be a single dwelling, a town, a region, a country, a continent... For some, indeed, it can be a proverbial as well as a literal four-letter word. It can be as simple - or as complicated - as a feeling. 

​Eligible applicants were invited to write a piece of flash fiction writing of up to 500 words in any genre they chose: sci-fi, thriller, romance, journalism, social record, historical fiction… all style were welcome. Or they could send us up to 500 words of creative non-fiction: a story of homecoming or migration, perhaps, or of home-making or -breaking. Or poems of up to 40 lines inspired by the theme.

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There will be cash prizes of £25 for the best entries in each of two age categories: 14-19 and 20+. ​In addition, shortlisted entries across all the categories will be published in an anthology that will be available in paperback and e-reader formats. Writers of selected pieces may also be invited to read their work at future Lit Fest events, either in person or online.