Golden Nib Submissions

Deadline August 1!

Virginia Writers Club’s 2026 Golden Nib writing contest opens to WBTR members on Wednesday, July 10th. Each submission must filter through the writer’s local chapter in order to be considered. That means you must submit your poem, fiction, or non-fiction piece through our chapter for judging before the top entries in each category can be forwarded to the state organization.

The strict submission rules and copies of the required cover sheet can be found here: VWC Golden Nib.  If you are a paid member of Write by the Rails AS WELL AS a paid member of the Virginia Writers Club, you may submit your entry (or entries) to wbtrsubmissions@gmail.com. Please read the guidelines very closely so that you can format your entry and your cover sheet correctly.

Our judges will send back any entry that lacks the proper formatting or does not

include the cover sheet IF THERE IS ENOUGH TIME before our submission deadline,

so please be diligent in adhering to the contest rules.

Only paid members of both organizations are eligible.

What to Expect
  • Once a submission is received, you will be notified by email (from the submission email account) that we are in receipt of your entry. If there are any errors with the submission AND we have enough time for the error to be corrected before we must submit results to the VWC, we will notify you of those errors. It is your responsibility to correct those errors within the time frame stipulated in the correction email. Failure to correct errors in a timely fashion may result in your submission being disqualified.
  • WBTR will submit winning entries to the VWC by the first week in September. From there, the VWC judges take over.
  • Winners will be announced at the VWC annual meeting which will be held in early November. Chapters do not get advance notice of who has won and cannot provide information about the status of your submission beyond letting you know it has been received, is (or is not) properly formatted, and is being evaluated by the judges. You should not expect to hear the results of the competition until around mid-November.