Welcome to the Guardian and 4th Estate 4thWrite Short Story Prize, a competition open to Black, Asian and minority ethnic writers living in the UK or Ireland who are 18 and above.
We want to read your story, whatever it may be.
We’re delighted to unveil the longlist for the 2024 Prize. The standard of entries was incredibly high, and we want to thank everyone who submitted a story. If you weren’t successful this year, please do try again next year.
The shortlist will be announced by 22nd November, and the winner on the 4th December at a prize ceremony in London.
Congratulations to all the longlisted writers!
JIE DU, BELATED
In Belated, after more than 20 years apart, a man receives a message from his first love, who wants to meet him in Beijing, but now married, a rising party official, he doubts it would be a simple rendezvous.
DU Jie is a journalist turned writer born and raised in China. He did his MFA in Creative Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University, where he won the Vice Chancellor’s International Scholarship Award. He has since written two novels. His short story appeared in The Bangalore Review. He’s currently based in Manchester.
Follow Jie on Instagram @du_jie_writer
HARRY GODFREY, A HORSE NAMED FIFER
In A Horse Named Fifer, as George begins his first term at a prestigious British university, it is revealed that he will be the only student of black heritage in his college. More concerned with his studies and finding a new group of which he can be a part, George initially seems indifferent to the revelation. However, a controversy surrounding the statue of a horse that belonged to the college’s colonialist founder focuses eyes on George, who finds himself forced to determine how to react in a situation where even neutrality is viewed as a political statement.
Harry studied Economics at the University of Cambridge, before working for a time as a professional economist. He was long-listed for the Royal Academy of Arts’ ‘RA & Pin Drop Short Story Award’ in 2017, completed a Creative Writing MA at Royal Holloway in 2020, and later that year was awarded a place on the Madeleine Milburn Mentorship scheme. He is currently undertaking a PhD researching how publishing industry behaviours and societal pressures shape/constrain the ability of authors to portray different ethnic identities in their fiction. The initial idea for this story came in 2019, with life somewhat imitating art a year later with the widespread protests of memorials across the UK.
MEHER IQBAL, STRAWBERRIES
A young British-Pakistani woman, Maysa, has been raised in a culture that is obsessed both with feeding people and commenting on their bodies. In Strawberries, she struggles to maintain her friendships and keep her job while battling an eating disorder in secret.
Meher Iqbal lives and works in London, and graduated from King’s College London with an English BA. She spends her weekends and evenings pursuing her creative passions, including writing short stories about young British South-Asian people; she hopes to start working a novel soon. She is currently shortlisted for the Aurora Writing Prize 2024 for her story Boys Like This. She is also building a freelance career as a copyeditor after having been selected for Hachette’s Changing the Story Freelancer Training Programme in 2023.
Follow Meher on Instagram @meher.iqbal and Twitter @me5h12
MARCELLA MARX, THE TIMING OF THINGS
The Timing of Things centres around a conversation between a mother and her teenage daughter, as the mother reflects on one of her teenage patients who is struggling with her sexual identity. The narrative highlights the tension between the passage of time and the quality of relationships, emphasising how individuals can become oblivious to the needs of those close to them.
Marcella Marx is a Brazilian writer and educator who holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Birkbeck. Her short stories have been longlisted for the Berlin Writing Prize and shortlisted for the Tennessee Williams & New Orleans Literary Festival. Currently, she is completing the final editing for her debut novel, “The Past is Another Country,” while simultaneously working on her second novel. Additionally she is taking part in the prestigious London Library Emerging Writers Programme for 2024/2025. Her short story titled “Icebergs” is forthcoming in The Georgia Review.
VEE MATSUMARI, THE SOUND OF WATER
The Sound of Water features a father recounting a family day at the beach during his daughter’s childhood, contemplating on the kinds of love that transform us.
V. Matsumari is a queer writer living in London. They have previously written for The Toe Rag, Rat World, Nowhere Girl Collective and Farrago. They self-published their debut poetry collection, Only Years in the Making, in 2024, and are also working on their first novel. When they’re not rearranging little black lines on a page, they can be found reading under a tree, exploring some body of water, or having a meal with friends.
Follow Vee on Instagram @vmatsumari
SUNAINA MENEZES, FESTERING ROOTS
On an island in Goa, India, a family returns for Christmas to their ancient house that has grown resentful of them.
Sunaina was raised in India, where she worked as an editor for a literary agency. She resides in London after an MA in English Literature from King’s College London. She has organised literary festivals, reported for the International Film Festival of India, and her play was staged at the National Centre for the Performing Arts. She is drawn to surrealism, and themes of psychological decay and deterioration.
Follow Sunaina on Instagram @sunainamenezes and Twitter @MenezesSunaina
SALEEL NURBHAI, LIVING WITH MISTER MANDU
Dira, a young doctor, has recently separated from her husband. Taking up lodgings with the middle-aged Mister Mandu, she spends her spare time nosing around his house and speculating about his life. When she discovers Mister Mandu is a fitness freak and a food fascist, she realises she’s seeing a future version of her ex. This leads to a sequence of events that make her call into question her own assumptions and behaviour, that challenge her attitude to food. She decides to make another change in her life.
Saleel Nurbhai was born in Mumbai, and grew up in the UK and Australia. His poems and stories have been published in The Inquisitive Eater, Structo Magazine and Eunoia Review. He has written academic articles and reviews, and is co-author of George Eliot, Judaism and the Novels. He lives in Lancaster.
TOYO ODETUNDE, TWENTY FRIENDS
Twenty Friends follows the unravelling of what was once the strongest of friendships. Tola and Dami share a sister-like bond which germinated at university, due to their contrasting yet complementary personalities. However, their relationship is abruptly destroyed when a routine catch-up, revealing Dami’s jealousy of her friend’s latest romantic endeavour, leads Dami to a nauseating revelation. Infusing Yorùbá proverbial wisdom to remind us of the timeless and universal nature of the human experience, Twenty Friends is a modern parabolic warning of the inevitability of human fallibility.
Toyo is a writer and culinary enthusiast from London. When she is not filling up pages or plates, she enjoys art and history exhibitions, live performances and documentaries. Oh, and drinking cocktails.
Follow Toyo on Instagram and Twitter @toyotastes
ISABELLA PERALTA, JOY
In Joy, a lonely salaryman purchases and assembles his ideal mail-order bride, only to discover that she has begun to dream of a life beyond their home — without him.
Isabella Peralta is a writer and educator based in England. As an advocate of racial and cultural diversity in literature and new media, she has worked for various organizations and platforms that champion underrepresented voices, including We Need Diverse Books. She is currently pursuing an MSt in Creative Writing at the University of Cambridge and working on her first novel.
Follow Isabella on Instagram and Twitter @isabellaperalta
ANVI PRABHU, IN THIS WORLD WE BURN IN DIFFERENT WAYS
Set in the 1980’s, a woman grapples with grief and her search for meaning and solace through her memories, cassette tapes, and tarot cards as she uproots herself from her childhood home in the Western Ghats to a snow laden winter in New York.
Anvi Prabhu is a London based, award winning multi-disciplinary artist. She has travelled, performed, and showcased her work widely across India, China, Bhutan, USA, and the UK. She holds an MA in Fine Arts from Chelsea college of Arts, London. She has published two chapbooks of poetry in 2011 and 2014. She has read her work at She Grrowls, Properganda festival and Fusion of Arts festival among others. In 2022 she founded ‘SOUL SAUCE LITERARY’, a bi-annual online magazine to showcase writings at the intersection of literature and philosophy. She is currently working on polishing the drafts of two novels, an experimental novella, and a short story collection.
Follow Anvi on Instagram @anviprabhuart
PRIYANKA VERMA, ASCEND
Ascend is about a woman who comes to live and work as a maid for an Indian family in a foreign country. As she builds her life and begins to find moments of connection and agency, her faith is ultimately put to test within a society where she has no real power.
Priyanka Verma is a writer of South Asian origin based in London. In 2022 she was selected for the Rewrite Academy, a writing development program for writers of colour. Her short stories have been longlisted for the CRAFT and The Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prizes. She is currently at work on a novel and a collection of short stories exploring themes of migration, class and womanhood.
YAN F. ZHANG, FLEETING MARROW
Spanning over eight decades, Fleeting Marrow is a story about a woman’s journey through life, her search for purpose, belonging and family, whilst coming to terms with loss and regret.
Yan F. Zhang is a fiction writer. She is an alum of the Napa Valley Writers Conference and Southampton Writers Conference fiction workshops. She was shortlisted for the Surrey New Writing Prize 2024 and longlisted for The Literary Consultancy Pen Factor Prize 2023.
Don’t forget to join the conversation online @4thestatebooks using the hashtag #4thWritePrize.
Our judges this year are Sheena Patel, author of I’m a Fan, which was an Observer Best Debut of 2022, Laline Paull, author of the Women’s Prize shortlisted novels The Bees and Pod, Zing Tsjeng, journalist and author of Forgotten Women, Emma Leong, literary agent at Janklow & Nesbit UK, Justine Jordan, Fiction Editor at the Guardian and Kishani Widyaratna, Publishing Director at 4th Estate and Editor of the Year at the 2024 British Book Awards.
