No purchase necessary to enter or win.

BY ENTERING OR OTHERWISE PARTICIPATING IN THIS WRITING CONTEST, ALL ENTRANTS AND OTHER PARTICIPANTS AGREE TO ABIDE BY THESE OFFICIAL WRITING CONTEST RULES, WHICH ARE FINAL AND BINDING ON ALL MATTERS PERTAINING TO THIS CONTEST.

5. Novel Submission Rules. Any novel you submit through this writing contest must comply with the following rules:

• ・Novels that have already participated in the MAL x Honeyfeed Writing Contest held in any of the previous years can not be entered into this contest.
• ・Novels must be written in English only. Novels written in other languages will not be considered and will be removed from the Honeyfeed site.
• ・Novels must follow the contest prompt of Futuristic High-Tech World, must fall under the Alt-History or Harmonic Future theme and contain at least one theme specific genre from the list indicated in the contest’s official page.
• ・Completed novels must contain a minimum 25,000 words and may contain up to a maximum of 75,000 words.
• ・Novels must be set to "Completed" on the Honeyfeed site before the entry period ends. This means your story must come to a conclusion on or before January 13, 2025.
• ・Note that changing the status of the novel or editing the novel to add content after January 13, 2025 will result in disqualification.
• ・No fanfics, collaborations, plagiarism, stolen or copyrighted content is allowed to be submitted as an entry. This includes both text and images related to your entry. Any novel you submit must be entirely your own original work created for this contest and posted only to Honeyfeed for the duration of the contest.
• ・Novels must be suitable for ages 17+ and be set to the "All audience" setting in Honeyfeed. No gore, heavy ecchi or soft porn is allowed. Your novel can not contain minors, or characters that look like/reference minors or under the age of 18 in erotic situations.
• ・Original novels that are already licensed by a literary agency and/or publisher, or are being self-published and sold on Amazon and other similar sites, are not eligible to participate in the contest.
• ・Users are not allowed to use MAL / HF sites or MAL / HF social media as a way to continuously persuade other users to read, like, comment or vote for their novel or any other user's novel (shilling, spamming). Self promoting on your own profile is allowed.
• ・Please also review the Judging Criteria as well.

Contest prompt, themes and genres

To enter the contest, your novel must have a specific prompt, theme, and genre(s). The prompt is the same for all novels and there are two themes to choose from: Alt-History or Harmonic Future. Both themes must include a Futuristic High-Tech World as the main plot point, and a theme related to either Alt-History or Harmonic Future, but not both. Each of the contest themes will have specific genres you can choose from for your novel, so please check the applicable genres according to the theme of your selection.

Prompt:

Futuristic High-Tech World

Themes and Genres:

For the Alt-History theme, you can choose the genres: Action, Military, Survival, Drama, Psychological. What we are looking for in novels that follow this theme is the following: A story where an event in humanity’s history went differently and caused a significant alteration in how the world exists today. The world presented in alt-history-themed stories should captivate the reader through its novelty and feature technology that is different and far more advanced than what we have at present and its influence on society.

For the Harmonic Future theme, you can choose the genres: Time Travel, Comedy, Adventure, Slice of Life, Romance. What we are looking for in novels that follow this theme is the following: A story that portrays a utopia-like world, wherein the main concerns of humanity (i.e. warfare, climate change, pollution, poverty, scarcity of goods) have been solved. The highlight of the solarpunk theme lies in the challenges of maintaining this world and how ordinary life has evolved and thrived thanks to this world's advanced technology.

For any novel submission, you must not submit any content that contains any elements that violate a third party’s copyrights, trademark rights, privacy rights or any other rights. Your novel submission and any other content you submit must comply with MAL’s Terms of Use regarding user content and Honeyfeed’s Terms of Service.

By submitting any novel or other content as part of this contest, you represent, warrant and agree that: (a) you are in compliance with these Official Writing Contest Rules and with MAL’s Terms of Use and Honeyfeed’s Terms of Service; (b) your novel(s) and any other content does not infringe or violate any third party rights; and (c) the novel(s) and any other content does not violate any law.

6. Contest Prizes. Prizes are available for participants who place first on each contest category. 3 Winners total for this contest. The prizes that are available to be won for this contest are the following:

Prize item description:	Estimated value:	No. of items available to win:	Other restrictions:
Winning prize for Alt-History	$3,000	1	N/A
Winning prize for Harmonic Future	$3,000	1	N/A
Winning prize for Jury Pick	$3,000	1	N/A

One novel out of the three winning novels will be having manga adaptation by WIT Studio. WIT Studio will receive a Japanese translation of the three winning stories from this contest and may, in its sole discretion, decide to adapt one of the winning stories. If your novel is selected for adaptation, additional agreement(s) will be required in connection with the adaptation.

To receive a prize, you may also be required to provide an affidavit of eligibility.

7. Judging Criteria, Selection of Winners and Odds of Winning. Sponsors will review the novel entries for this contest and, once the entry period ends, the novel entries will be narrowed down to a total of 10 finalists before moving on to the public voting phase. To narrow the novel entries down to a total of 10, the judges will use the following criteria:

Presentation & Publishing:

• • The novel has a cover image and it's properly credited to the artist or the AI tool used in the image description.
• • Word count per chapter is roughly around 1,000 to 1,500 words.
• • Novel chapters are not posted all at once.
• • The novel is updated once or more weekly or the author offers a posting schedule.
• • The novel has an appealing synopsis.
• • The novel has the appropriate genre labels that describe the story.

Storytelling:

• • The novel story progresses at a good pace and each chapter has a hook.
• • The novel has good English grammar & syntax.
• • The novel has good world-building and character development.
• • The novel properly applied the contest prompt and themes.
• • The story is relatable, easy to follow, and fun to read.
• • The story's plot is resolved within 25k to 75k words.

Public Engagement:

• • The author makes an effort to connect with the reader community and promote themselves in the correct promo spaces.
• • The public reacts well to the novel. (Positive comments, returning comments.)
• • The author replies to comments in a timely manner.
• • The author complied with Honeyfeed Site's and/or Honeyfeed's Discord Community Guidelines & left a positive impression.

After the novel entries are narrowed down to 10 by the sponsor’s judges, the public voting phase will begin as follows:

Public voting for finals (March 3 to March 30, 2025). During this period, the 10 judge-selected novels will be posted to a special voting page.

The winners will be announced on April 6, 2025.

Odds of Winning: The odds of your novel being selected and included with the 10 novels selected by the judges are dependent upon the number of eligible submissions received by Sponsors, the above-referenced criteria and the judges’ opinions. During the voting phase, a number of people assigned as ‘Jury’ will review and rate the overall content of your completed submission. The odds of your novel being selected in the public voting phase depends on the number of votes received in this phase as well as the review and feedback of the Jury.

Sponsors may communicate with potential winners at the email address registered with the potential winners’ MyAnimeList or Honeyfeed accounts with further information and any additional requirements to accept the prizes. If a potential winner cannot be contacted within 72 hours, fails to respond to any attempted contact, is in any way not in compliance with these Official Writing Contest Rules, or declines to, does not or cannot accept the prize to be awarded, such potential winner will be disqualified and his/her entry and submission will be declared null and void.

8. Release. By entering this writing contest, you release Sponsors and their affiliates, employees, officers, directors, managers and agents from any liability whatsoever, and waive any and all causes of action, related to any claims, costs, injuries, losses or damages of any kind arising out of or in connection with this contest or transmission, failed transmission or acceptance of any prize (including, without limitation, claims, costs, injuries, losses and damages related to personal injuries, death, damage to or destruction of property, rights of publicity or privacy, defamation or portrayal in a false light, whether intentional or unintentional), whether under a theory of contract, tort (including negligence), warranty or any other theory.

9. Sponsors’ Reservation of Rights. Sponsors reserve the right, in their sole discretion, to terminate, cancel, suspend and/or revise the contest for any or no reason. Sponsors reserve the right in their sole discretion to disqualify any individual in violation of these Official Writing Contest Rules or if Sponsors discover such individual to be tampering with the entry process or the operation of the contest or acting in an unlawful or disruptive manner. Sponsors' failure to enforce any term or provision of these Official Writing Contest Rules shall not constitute a waiver of that term or provision.

10. Privacy. Information collected from you in connection with this contest will be used by Sponsors for their administration of the contest, including to verify your eligibility and notify potential winners and to fulfill prizes. In addition, Sponsors may use information collected about you to send you offers or information from us about MAL’s or Honeyfeed’s products and services, or about the products and services of our affiliates and business partners. If you do not wish to receive such offers and information, you may opt-out at any time by following the instructions at the bottom of any promotional email you receive or by following other opt-out instructions provided in the communication. Information collected is otherwise subject to and may be used and shared by Sponsors in accordance with MyAnimeList's Privacy Policy at https://myanimelist.net/about/privacy_policy, Honeyfeed’s Privacy Policy at https://www.honeyfeed.fm/privacy, and applicable law.

11. Contact Information. Please direct any questions or comments regarding the writing contest to Customer Support.