Author: paraxenesmeres

We are glad to announce that the book ”I have decided to remain vertical” –by Gayelene Carbis (Australia) won the writers choice award.

It was the first time ever we launched this award that is a distinction equal to the Grand Prize that’s why the winner gets the same prize (five days staying in Athens to attened the cerempny) or if she /he prefers to have the book translated into Greek.

It was the first time that Gayelene submitted a book into our contest.

The prize is very important also because prize winner writers vote for it! We thank and congratulate all of them!

I have decided to remain vertical was the prize winning book of the published/poetry category

Gayelene Carbis is an award-winning Australian/Irish/Chinese/Cornish writer of poetry, prose, short film, and plays. Gayelene’s first poetry collection, Anecdotal Evidence (Five Islands Press) was awarded Finalist, International Best Book Award, U.S. Her second book of poetry, I Have Decided to Remain Vertical (Puncher and Wattmann) has been Finalist /Distinguished Favourite in numerous international poetry book awards in 2023 and 2024 (U.K.; U.S.) and most recently awarded Highly Commended in the NSW Society of Women Writers’ Poetry Book Award 2024.
Gayelene’s work has been widely published, performed and won/been finalist in poetry, prose, short film and playwriting awards in Australia/overseas, including India, Malaysia, Nepal, Edinburgh, Oxford, New York, and Canada, where she was awarded a Banff Residency Scholarship in Poetry. She teaches Creative Writing in universities and at Sandy beach (Sandringham) and works as a writing mentor and manuscript assessor. She is currently working on two collections: prose poetry; and auto-fiction/memoir.
Gayelene lives and works on the unceded land of the Boonwurrung people.

Five questions to each of our prize winners.

1. How do you feel to be a prize winner of an international book contest?

2. Is this your first prize or distinction in your writing career?

3. What was the inspiration of your book?

4. What does it mean for you as a writer to win a prize?

5. What are your writing plans for the future?

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IRYNA POLISCHUK
(Ukraine)
CHILDREN’S BOOK UNPUBLISHED
Braveheart

1.It is a great honour for me to be part of an international writing contest, especially of Eyelands Book Awards. This unique competition gives me a chance to become part of it. Thanks to amazing judges to choose my story this year!

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  2. It is my fourth prize in my writing career and I am happy to receive it!

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3. My book Brave Heart is a winner this year, the category – Children Books Unpublished. It is part of a book series about an old cat from the shabbycardboard box, a little girl and their friends. It is full of hope, care and love. I understand quite well that today’s life of children is full of troubles and disasters. Unfortunately, they face difficulties and disappointments more often than they should. So, we should care about their mental health most of all.

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4. Kind and good literature helps children to overcome all these difficulties. Warm colour of the rainbow treats better than cold drops of the rain. Literature teaches how tocooperate,to communicate, to create something special, to understand the universe and to help each other in today’s troubled world. Reading is an incredible tool to make children’s dreams come true in adult life.

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5 .As for my future plan, I just say as Elton John said in his song – I’m still standing:) For sure, I will continue to write stories for kids. It has become animportant part of my life.  I strongly believethat one day my stories find the way to the heart which needs it, even in the darkest time, and bring a magic light to a child’s world.

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ALEKSANDRA TRYNIECKA
(Poland)
CHILDREN’S BOOK PUBLISHED
Bunky and the Summer Wish

1. It is a true honour to become a prize winner of an international book contest – and, specifically, the prize winner of the amazing Eyelands Book Awards Contest! I am thinking about my wonderful Fellow Authors participating in Eyelands Book Awards 2024 whose books are also written from the bottom of their hearts – and I am honoured to find myself among them.  I am also thinking about the wonderful Readers who are behind every book – and I feel a deep responsibility! I am overjoyed inside and deeply grateful to the Judging Committee for finding value in my work – Bunky’s story is a part of me, and receiving Eyelands Book Awards prize means the world to me!

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It is not the first prize in my writing career, yet each of the prizes received for my books means so much to me in unique ways, as each distinction is special, irreplaceable and offers me a conviction that writing is such a significant part of my life – especially writing Bunky’s book series. It also offers me what I call “literary wings” – a desire to offer my Readers the best of my works: to keep creating and writing in a genuine, passionate, graceful and loving way; to always offer “my best”. The feeling accompanying the reception of each distinction cannot be repeated. Receiving Eyelands Book Awards prize is such a significant moment in my writing career, as during the contest I could  learn more about my amazing Fellow Authors who were competing in the same category (Children’s Books – Published) and learn about their beautiful works – each being one of the kind! I am deeply honoured that Bunky and the Summer Wish received such an incredible distinction – especially while being able to discover truly fabulous works written by my Fellow Authors!

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I believe that my literary character – Bunky – had always been deep inside my heart even before writing his story. I wrote the first book about Bunky – Bunky and the Walms: The Christmas Story (Wipf and Stock/ Resource Publications, 2021) – my debut novel – while realizing that I would like to share with the readers the world of an imperfect yet noble character with whom they would be able to sympathize and who could become the Hero of his Own Life. In May 2019 I was attending a conference in London and, during one of the breaks, I discovered a store with plush toys. One of the plush toys – a hippo – had a very humanlike expression on his face. It was partly critical, partly joyful – and I thought that this face expression might be hiding an amazing story! I began writing, and Bunky fully came to life! Then, while waiting for the publication of my novel, I took a thread and a needle and sewed my characters and their clothes – I wanted to have them close to me and to bridge the gap between our world and their literary reality. The second novel dedicated to Bunky – Bunky and the Summer Wish (2024) – was inspired by my desire to further portray Bunky as the hero of his Own Life – for I deeply believe that this is the most difficult and beautiful of tasks. While writing Bunky and the Summer Wish I was aware that Bunky’s story was not complete. Also, his further story was planted in my heart as soon as I finished writing the first volume. The Readers were hoping to hear more from Bunky as well, and I felt that, without Bunky’s story, my world would be incomplete too – as he became such a huge part of my life. In fact, Bunky is quite similar to me! In each book about Bunky I also hope to present what I call a “bunkyful life” – the type of life filled with positive magic, hope, goodness, nobility, kindness, gratitude, homeliness and joy from the simplest, tiniest things – a wholesome, fulfilling life that Bunky’s story celebrates. The kind of life we need the most.

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Winning a prize for a writer opens up a new door to creativity and paves the way for a new timeline in one’s writing career. It is like a magical portal allowing the writer to rejoice in each written word on a new, profoundly distinctive level. Winning a prize offers a deep reassurance, joy and powerful motivation to create at one’s best – it offers confidence that one’s voice is needed and creates an impact. It is like a beautiful meadow through which a writer strolls.

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Thank you! I cannot imagine my life without writing, and there is so much writing-related planning going on in my heart now at the onset of 2025. I definitely hope to expand Bunky’s story. Currently, I am also putting the finishing touches on my poetry collection which means a lot to me on a personal level too. Moreover, I am writing and editing a novel dedicated to adults, and it will be my first adult fiction. I am excited while thinking about the future writing journey – about each book, every Reader and Fellow Author encountered on this beautiful literary path! However, wherever it takes me, I am taking Bunky with me! J

                                                                   With love and best wishes,
Aleksandra

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KAREN MARTIN
(Australia)
SELF PUBLISHED
Dancing the Labyrinth

1. Receiving the news I had won was a shot of pure happiness. I feel proud, happy and thrilled. It’s an honour forDancing the Labyrinthto be recognised internationally, andthe Award affirmsall the passion and hard work that went into writing it. By celebrating the quality and innovation of self-published novels, the Eyelands Book Award showcases its forward-thinking and inclusive approach to the literary world. It’s a privilege to be part of this prestigious recognition.

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2. Dancing the Labyrinth was my debut novel and to receive an Award for it, acknowledges my voice on the page and the stories I wish to write. I have received other awards and distinction for my theatre work: writing, and notably directing, The Women’s Jail Project, as well presentations and papers delivered at conferences and events.

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3. The seed of this novel came from a deeply personal question: How, as a mother, can I raise my son to be a decent human being? The unspoken part of that question, of course, is: “in a patriarchal society.” In Australia, where domestic violence rates continue to rise, I felt a sense of accountability – not just as a mother, but as someone contributing to the next generation. As a theatre writer, I was surprised when the idea presented as a novel. I decided to embrace this and, having planned to spend a year in Crete, began writing there. At the time, I knew nothingof the Minoans, so I was delighted to find myself walking the ancient paths of this matriarchal society. The more I researched, the more the narrative emerged.The novel became dual time, and it was satisfying learning aboutan area of women’s history I was ignorant of, and then use this knowledge to feed into the contemporary sections of the novel.  I couldn’t have written this book anywhere else – Crete is a place of incredible strength and inspiration.The land itself breathes stories.

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4. Winning this prize is deeply affirming – it’s like the Muses handing me a little note that says, ‘Keep going, you’re on the right path.’ Writing can be a solitary, doubt-riddled process, so recognition through this Award celebrates the heart, soul and vulnerability integral to my creative process.

On a broader level, it’s heartening to see self-published works being acknowledged for their quality and innovation. Awards like this help shift perceptions, opening doors for indie authors and celebrating the diversity of voices in the literary world. For me personally, it supports my dream of writing layered and ambitious stories that contribute in some way to society, and to trust that the stories I want to write have a place in the world.

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5. I have recently released the sequel  – Delphi, to great acclaim, and feel for the time being, Cressida’s story and healing is complete. My next project is a memoir of when I lived in Crete and wrote Dancing the Labyrinth:

What is the outcome of awakening a persona unhindered by constraints of known behaviour, established expectations or obligations? Where the shift and sway of the cloak of responsibility to a different rhythm enables a capacity to listen without prejudice to one’s heart. For one year I lived encased in a foreign terrain of body and spirit, and it is an analytical plungeinto its potential influence onmy creative process that forms this narrative.

Notwithstanding, this memoir could also be read as a travelogue of Crete. Pick your poison.

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PAUL W.B. MARSDEN
(Wales)
HISTORICAL NOVEL/MEMOIR UNPUBLISHED
Darkness in 1984

1 I am thrilled to have won Historical Fiction Unpublished Prize. When you write you don’t write to win prizes. You write because you have the passion inside to create. As Albert Camus said, you live twice by creating, whether that is writing, art or music. But, it does make a world of difference to your self confidence to be validated and recognised by Eyelands, especially as it is an international award. With so many writers from different cultures and native languages it feels like an even greater recognition.

My book, Darkness in 1984, was a full-on commitment, including visiting the North Wales cottage, where George Orwell stayed with Arthur Koestler at Christmas 1945. An English writer, born in India staying with a Hungarian writer in Wales! 

I am so grateful to Mr and Mrs Brown, the owners of Bwlch Ocyn cottage, for letting me look inside and especially looking through the window of Arthur’s study, hidden behind the fireplace!

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2. This is the first prize I have received for a novel and the most important one to date.

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3. I have always been fascinated by writers meeting writers. What do they talk about? Do they share ideas? Are they jealous of each other? Do they steal ideas?! When I heard of the tale that George Orwell stayed with Arthur Koestler at Christmas in 1945, I thought there has to be a good story in it! And there was!

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4. Surprise! Joy! Relief!  It means that someone else likes what I have written and, more importantly, someone who is a professional has judged it worthy.

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5. I have finished writing ‘Making A Moveable Feast’ which is the ‘Hemingway Tapes in Paris’ of the daily conversations of 1922 between Hadley, Hem, Gertrude Stein, Alice B. Toklas, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Djuna Barnes and all the other members of the Lost Generation. I am seeking a publisher or I may self publish as an ebook. A sequel has mostly been drafted of the Hemingways in 1923 as they visited Italy, Germany, Spain and Switzerland.

Thank you Eyelands!

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TIMOTHY JAY SMITH
(France)
NOVELS PUBLISHED
Istanbul Crossing

1. It feels great, of course! It’s also reaffirming. It impliesthat I have readers who like my work and my stories, I’m especially glad to win an ‘international’ book contest because my books are set around the world: Istanbul, a Greek island, Warsaw, Jerusalem, elsewhere where I’ve lived or spent enough time to portray the setting with authenticity. It’s a challenge nevertheless, so I’m always glad when an international committee feels that I’ve succeeded on that score.

2. No, it’s not, though an EyelandsBook Award is certainly a coveted one. For novels, I’ve also won or placed in the Faulkner-Wisdom Writing Competition, the Lambda Literary Awards, the Paris Prize for Fiction (now the DeGroot Literary Prize), and others.I also write stage plays and screenplays, including spec scripts and adaptations of mynovels. Altogether, I’ve won or placed in 100+ writings contests.

3. My partner and I have been going to the same Greek village on the island of Lesvos for the last 20 years. By happenstance, our village was Ground Zero for the refugee crisis peaking in 2015-2017. In one twelve-month period, an estimated 500,000 refugees landed on the beach adjacent to our village of 1500 year-round residents.

When I start a novel, I first decide on what pressing issue of our timesthat I want to illuminate for my readers. I’ve written about human trafficking, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and what the fall of communism meant for ordinary families in Eastern Europe. I decided I wanted to write a novel highlighting the refugee crisis through the story of one or two refugees.

That book, Fire on the Island, ultimately became more of an homage to Greece than a refugee story. That’s understandable. My first job after college was in Greece and I fell in love with it. Ultimately, I would spend some 7 years of my life in the country. So what Fire on the Island became was a story about how the villagers responded to the refugees, and how the refugees reignited conflicts among the villagers that went back 100 years.

When I finished Fire on the Island, I still wanted to write a refugee story. I realize that I could describe every step a refugee would take once he or she arrived on Greece’s shore to make their way to northern Europe. What I didn’t know was how the refugees made their way to Istanbul to get on a raft to make the dangerous crossing to Greece.

I went to Istanbul to find out. I hired a young Syrian refugee who worked for an organization helping other refugees by providing various social services. I asked him to show me Istanbul from the refugees’ perspective. It turned out that he was also a people smuggler. That is to say, he survived by helping other refugees make the crossing to Greece. Though he wasn’t gay like my main character in Istanbul Crossing, he was still the inspiration for that character in terms of his compassion and willingness to take risks to help others.

4. I have a new publisher, Leapfrog Press, who plans to reprint Fire on the Island. That’s scheduled to be released on April 29th and I am working on some edits to it. I also have a challenging new novel in mind. It would be my first book set in America. I’m 16th generation American and for most of my life I’ve been proud of that. Lately, I’ve become less so. I’m at the very beginning stages of writing a novel that questions what is the legacy of those 16 generations.

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REV PHILIPS
(USA)
POETRY UNPUBLISHED
Waiting for Godot in the blue Corolla

 1.  I am honored and pleased to be recognized in this international assembly of poets and writers. Thank you.

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2. I have been writing since I was seven and publishing in many poetry journals, but since I retired from full-time work, at last I have time to write more, send more work out into the world, and enter some contests. This past year I was nominated for two Pushcart poetry awards. I have been a finalist many times, including last year’s Eyelids Book  Award for my previous collection, “Wrestling With the Angel”, published last Fall by Wipe and Stock Publishers. I have won First Prizes in The Letter Review Poetry Contest (2023), the Westmoreland (PA) Arts and Heritage Festival Poetry Contest (2022), the Lincoln (CA) Poetry Contest (2022), The Princemere Poetry Contest (2021), and the WOMR/WFMR Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Contest (MA) (2022, plus a couple of second prizes and honorable mentions/shortlists.

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3. One of my recurring themes is spiritual exploration, in the widest sense. Like many poets I revisit my particular story to trace its meanings and possibilities, as well as parsing the wider world for meanings, for some threads of transcendence, joy, and justice.

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4. It is a nice affirmation that some people far beyond my circle find the work worthy, enjoyable, and ready to be shared more widely. I love the human response to words sent out hopefully, like bread on the waters, not knowing whether anyone will hear or resonate with them. I am grateful to those who lend their expertise and time and care to judging and editing poets’ work.

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5. I have a third chapbook coming out from Finishing Line Press this coming Fall: “Sailing To the Edges”, containing a long narrative poem about the voyage of Amundsen to first explore Antarctica on the ship Belgica. I am also working on a second collection: “Memos To the Great Attractor”. I write every day, so there’s no telling what might come forth next!

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JIMMY TINDEL
(India)
SPECIAL DISTINCTION (novels unpublished)
The Lost Vimana

1. I feel very great after winning contest because I didn’t expect that I am 16-17 year old and I just upload my book and win I am just wordless.

2. It is my first prize and I like it so much it is inspiration for me to write more books

3. the inspiration of my book is our Hindu religion refrences and books and scriptures.

4. It means alot so much I can’t even express it I am so happy thank you eyeland book awards.

5. In future I am gonna write one book on self help or this part continues

The contest runs from January 20th through April 20th, 2025

The theme of the contest this year is «2025»

First prize: 500 euros

All the stories of the short list will be published & released through amazon.com & strange days books.

Entry fee: 10 €, (15 per 2 stories, 20 euro per 3 stories)

Judges: Writers of the short list vote for the grand prize winner

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RULES OF THE CONTEST

* Theme of the contest: 2025. We want stories inspired from this year

*Entries must be short stories, of any genre, maximum length is 3, 000 words and must be previously unpublished in a book. Entries must be in English.

* The contest closes at midnight UTC on 20th of April

*This is an international contest. There is no restriction such as nationality etc of the author, but you have to be 18 years old on the 20^th of January 2025 to enter the contest otherwise parental permission is needed.

* No eyelands.gr or strange days books’editor, judge, or relative of them, is allowed to enter.

* Entries must be submitted electronically (see below).to: eyelandsmag@gmail.com

* Shortlist to be announced on May10^th, 2025

* Writers of the short list will vote for the grand prize winner, to be announced on June, 20, 2025

*Voting for the best story is obligatory for the writers otherwise their story will not be published.

* Copyright of manuscripts remains to the author.

* In addition to the story being published on http://www.eyelands.gr, the author’s acceptance of the prize gives eyelands.gr the right to include the story in the anthology that will appear in book form.

Entry grants permission to include the shortlisted stories in the book.

PRIZES

First prize is 500 euros, plus a Greek translation of the first prize winning story, published online on eyelands.gr

All the shortlisted stories –no more than 20- will be published in the anthology.

All the shortlisted writers will also get a free copy of the book!

ENTRY FORM AND PAYMENT

Pay via paypal – See the banner and all the details here: http://www.eyelandsawards.com

Click the «buy now» button. Fill the description with: EISSC

Entry fee is 10 euros per story

*Email your story without your name

*An email confirmation that your entry has been received will be sent within three days after receiving your e-mail

*We don’t accept postal entries

* We do accept simultaneous submissions

* Every writer can submit up to three stories but only one story per writer will be shortlisted/published

* Name and address of the author should appear only in the body of the email

*The title of your story can be anything other than “2025”

Eyelands.gr launched its first international short story contest in 2010. We launched 10 consecutive contests till 2020. And after a break here we are again with the 11^th Eyelands Inernational Short Story Contest!

Thanks and Good luck to all!!

How does it feel to be the grand prize winner of an international book contest?

I’m thrilled to be the grand prize winner of the Eyelands awards. This is my first time winning a contest outside of North America, and the fact that the contest is based in Greece, the birthplace of Western literature, is mind-blowing to me.

How did you hear about the contest?

I Googled contests that accept short story collections.

When did you start writing?

I always had an interest in reading when I was young. I never thought of the books I read as “literature,” or of having any kind of point beyond absorbing me into a good story. I started writing when I was in my early twenties, (bad) poetry at first, then short stories. I was terrible, so decided to take classes and workshops in university, and have been writing steadily ever since.

I can see from your bio that you have won a lot of distinctions for your writings. Is this the first time that one of your stories will be translated in another language

Yes! This blows my mind.

You wrote an excellent book. What was the inspiration for ‘’Pagodas of the Sun–Japan Stories’’?

I lived and worked in Japan from the late 1990’s to the early 2000’s as an ESL teacher. I ended up marrying a Japanese woman and we returned to Canada, and now have biracial twin daughters. After my return to Canada, I was inspired by the things I saw and did in Japan and wanted to write stories that captured some of my real and imagined experiences there. I read a book of stories by Mary Yukari Waters called “The Laws of Evening” which was set in Japan and covered different time periods through Japanese history, and I wondered if I might be able to also write stories like that, but from varied perspectives and with more of a focus on intercultural elements.

If this short story collection were to be adapted for a movie script what kind of movie do you think it would be?

The stories are told from varied points of view (Western, Japanese, male, female, adult, child, inanimate objects) and different time periods (the 1920’s, 1940’s, 1990’s, and modern day). Some are funny, some are surreal, some are dramatic, and some build tension and suspense, so it’s difficult to hone in on a specific movie genre. But the one thing the stories all have in common is that they strive to speak to the universal condition of connections and to the same sense of place, longing, fear, and the need to belong, so I could see this book being a similar kind of movie as Robert Altman’s “Short Cuts,” which was based on several Raymond Carver short stories.

How do you feel with the idea that your book will be translated in Greek?

This blows my mind. I have published short stories in literary journals over the years (8 from this collection have been published so far) but this is my first book publication. The collection has yet to be published in English, so getting my first book published in Greek first is a unique and thrilling step in my journey as writer.

Have you ever visited Greece?

No. It has been a lifelong dream of mine and my wife’s to visit Greece. Who knows, maybe we can come when the book launches!

How do you feel with the idea you will be the judge for Eyelands Books Awards 2025?

It is a thrill and honor to be asked to judge next year’s Eyelands Book Awards. I’m looking forward to giving back to the contest and to discovering new voices.

Can you tell us more about your recently finished novel which has also to do with Japan?

My novel, “Sea of Clouds,” is set during the 1923 Tokyo earthquake. It’s about an opium-addicted American anthropologist who rescues an orphaned Japanese baby form the earthquake and ends up walking with her 70 miles from Tokyo to Mount Fuji across the devastated region to try to get her to her father. It’s based on true events covering the daysfollowing the 1923 Kantoearthquake, and it took me ten years to research and write.

What are your writing plans for the future?

I’m currently working on my second novel about a youngmanwho, after discovering the mother who abandoned him as a child has terminal cancer, flees with her and his sister to Miami and tries to sell $200,000 worth of stolen drugs to pay for experimental surgery that may save her life.

GRAHAM ARNOLD

G. S. Arnold has an MA in English in the Field of Creative Writing from the University of Toronto and works at a career college in Toronto, Canada. His work has appeared in literary journals such as The Malahat Review, Event Magazine, Ninth Letter, Asia Literary Review, Glimmer Train, Prairie Fire, and The Masters Review. Along with receiving numerous Toronto, Ontario and Canada Arts Council grants as well as a Pushcart and a Journey Prize nomination, his stories have been short or long listed in contests such as the Writer’s Union of Canada Short Prose competition, the 2019 CBC short story award, the international Bridport Prize for short stories, and the Masters Review Short Story Anthology. He has recently finished his debut novel “Sea of Clouds,” set during the 1923 Tokyo earthquake

Dear friends

We are glad to announce the prize and grand prize winners of the year 2024.

NOVELS UNPUBLISHED

A Generation of Leaves – Alexander Matheou

Malaysia

NOVELS PUBLISHED

Istanbul Crossing – Timothy Jay Smith

France

POETRY UNPUBLISHED

Waiting for Godot in the blue Corolla – Jennifer M Phillips

USA

POETRY PUBLISHED

I have decided to remain vertical – Gayelene Carbis

Australia

SHORT STORY UNPUBLISHED

Black Crescent – Townsend Walker

UK

SHORT STORY PUBLISHED

Occupations -Anna Mantzaris

USA

HISTORICAL NOVEL/MEMOIR UNPUBLISHED

Darkness in 1984 – Paul W. B. Marsden

Wales

HISTORICAL NOVEL/MEMOIR PUBLISHED

Today In Paradise – Andrew Corin

New Zealand

CHILDREN’S BOOK UNPUBLISHED

Braveheart – Iryna Polishchuck

Ukraine

CHILDREN’S BOOK PUBLISHED

Bunky and the Summer Wish – Aleksandra Tryniecka

Poland

SELF PUBLISHED

Dancing the Labyrinth – Karen Martin

Australia

SPECIAL DISTINCTION  U20 (novels)

The Lost Vimana – Jimmy  Tandel

India

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GRAND PRIZE WINNER UNPUBLISHED

Pagodas of the Sun—Japan Stories – G. S. Arnold

 Canada

GRAND PRIZE WINNER PUBLISHED

Little Fortified Stories – Barbara Black

Canada

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Judges: P.H.C. Marchesi (children’s books/graphic novels), Andriana Minou (short stories – poetry), Ilinda Stefanova (novels) Gregory Papadoyiannis (historical novels, self-published books)

**Congratulations to all!

It is the first time that there are two grand prize winners from the Short Stories category, plus they have Canada as place of residence.

***Eyelands international short story returns on January 20!