Whether it's the road not taken...
a face you can't forget...
or the shadow in the corner...
Tell us the story that haunts you.
Special Event
WSHU, the NPR affiliate station based out of Sacred Heart University, and Westport Writers’ Workshop are pleased to host a contest that invites Connecticut residents to submit original, short-form personal stories (500 - 700 words). Through this contest celebrating the power of storytelling and personal reflection, we encourage writers to explore the theme:
What Haunts You?
Submissions must reflect on the theme - creative interpretation is encouraged. While we welcome your ghost stories, we also look forward to reading your deeper interpretations of what it means to have a lingering doubt, fear or emotion.
CT Voices is a community writing contest presented by NPR affiliate station WSHU Public Radio in collaboration with Westport Writers’ Workshop. The contest invites Connecticut residents to share original, short-form personal stories for the opportunity to be published and recorded on WSHU and WWW platforms and cash prizes.
First-place winner agrees to:
Submissions must not include:
WSHU & Westport Writers’ Workshop reserves the right to disqualify any submission that violates these guidelines.
Connecticut Voices (WT) is a community nonfiction/creative nonfiction writing contest presented by WSHU Public Radio in collaboration with Westport Writers’ Workshop. The contest invites Connecticut residents to share original, short-form personal stories for the opportunity to be recognized, published, and featured on WSHU.
Entries will be reviewed by a panel from WSHU and Westport Writers’ Workshop based on:
All decisions by the judges are final.
Winners will be notified via email and publicly announced on WSHU & Westport Writers’ platforms.
WSHU and Westport Writers' Workshop are pleased to offer our community a complimentary workshop designed to support writers of all levels, whether or not they plan to submit to the contest. Join us on September 10th for an online workshop led by Terry Sheridan and Suzanne Farrell Smith focused on maximizing the impact of your short-form writing, with techniques and strategies applicable to both audio storytelling and traditional written formats.
Thursday
September 10, 2026
6:30 pm – 8:30 pm EDT
Online
Free
Join us for a complimentary workshop as a lead-up to our CT Voices: WWWxWSHU Radio Contest.
For the first part, Terry Sheridan, the WSHU News Director, will work with writers on the fundamentals of writing and revising for radio. How do we compel listeners to keep listening? Which tools do writers need to write for the “theater of the mind”?
For the second hour, Creative Nonfiction instructor and author, Suzanne Farrell Smith, will teach tools for brevity. It’s one thing to write short pieces. It’s another to write strong short pieces. How do writers of very short nonfiction compress so much meaning and energy into so few words? How do we make a flash feel complete? And what kind of writing process generates these small written wonders? Suzanne will provide prompts and revision strategies for flash CNF pieces that writers could submit to the contest.
Before you Submit!
Clicking this link will open your default email service (ex, Gmail). If this does not work for you, please directly email Westport Writers’ Workshop’s at [email protected] with the subject “CT Voices Contest Submission”.
