Highlights Magazine | Cathy C. Hall Writes

I’m ending 2009 with a great way to start 2010: The Highlights Fiction Contest!

With three (Yes, three!) prizes worth $1,000 each (Yes, $1,000!) AND no entry fee, it’s crazy not to give this contest a try. Which is why every year, between January 1 and 31st, I write a story and send it to the folks at Highlights.

I haven’t won this contest yet, but the stories I’ve written for the Highlights Fiction Contest have won in other children’s fiction contests. So, technically, that’s a win, right? Which is why I’m starting my year, thinking about family stories (the theme for this year’s contest). As the saying goes, I’ve got a million of ’em.

I just have to clean them up a bit for the kiddies!

(Find all the details here, and read EVERYTHING! Including a couple of issues of Highlights Magazine for Kids!)

I had zipped over to the Highlights Magazine website to check on a contributor’s guideline or two when I came across this sentence:

“For more tips and information of interest to writers, visit www.HighlightsFoundation.org.”

Huh. I’d completely missed that little gem of a keeper. So, off I zipped to check it out. And when I clicked on Writer’s Tips, I struck gold! I was having so much fun, I clicked on the second spot that those helpful folks at Highlights suggested: Highlights for Kids!

I get the newsletter delivered to my Inbox and read it every month. Because if you want to write for a magazine, then you should know what that magazine publishes, right? And besides, I love those Hidden Pictures. And I can actually win some of those games.

So, maybe this won’t be the year I make a Highlights conference. But I can take advantage of the writing tips that all those gifted writers have shared over the years. And maybe I’ll strike gold with the next article or craft I send to Highlights.

That would be almost as awesome as finding all the objects in the Hidden Pictures.