• The Bath Novel Award 2021 is a prize for emerging novelists of any nationality or residency
• Novels can be in any genre written for adult or young adult readers
• Novels must be your original work and submitted in English
• Novels can be unpublished, self-published or independently published
• For the purposes of the competition, we define ‘self-published or independently published’ as published without an advance payment.
• Writers who have accepted an offer of publication with advance for the submitted novel or any other novel are not eligible
• Entrants may be agented or unagented, but should not be represented by either the judging agent or any agent within the judging agent’s agency
• The winner of The Bath Novel Award 2021 will be announced in September 2021 and awarded £3,000
• Entrants retain full copyright, however by entering, all shortlisted entrants give permission for us to post an extract of up to 5,000 words on our site
• By entering the winner agrees to an interview which may be published on our site and in any media for publicity purposes
• The longlist will be announced at www.bathnovelaward.co.uk in June 2021 with longlisted writers invited to submit their full manuscript for the final judging stages
• The writer of the most promising longlisted novel, as chosen by the Bath Novel Award and Cornerstones Literary Consultancy will receive a free place on Cornerstones’ 18 week online course Edit Your Novel the Professional Way.  The value of this prize is £1,800. The course is non-transferable and there is no cash alternative to this prize.
• Shortlisted novels will be announced in July 2021
• Unrepresented shortlisted writers will be offered the opportunity to be introduced to an individually tailored list of literary agents by email or other means.
• Entries are open from December 1st 2020 until 23:59 (BST) on May 31st 2021
• As entries are read blind, your name should not appear anywhere in your extract/synopsis document
• Submissions should be a single document which includes (up to) the first 5,000 words of a novel of at least 50,000 words followed by a one page synopsis
• Extracts should be 1.5 or double-spaced in a 12pt font followed by a one page synopsis single spaced in a 12pt font.
• If submitting your work online, we accept Word docs, docx and pdf
• If submitting by post, entries should be postmarked no later than 31st May 2020
• Submissions may not be altered after entry
• The entrance fee is £28 per novel and you may enter as many novels as you wish
• Sponsored places are available for writers on low incomes, more details here 
• Entries which do not comply with the competition rules may be disqualified
• Employees of the Bath Novel Award, Cornerstones Literary Consultancy and the judge’s agency are not eligible