About the contest
Lessons in Longing: A Back-to-School Romance Contest 2026
Term has begun, and every hallway hides a story. Lessons in Longing invites you to write a romance set in a school. College, boarding school, academy, training camp, any era, any twist that gets the nostalgia flowing.
🎓 We're looking for every kind of school romance: dark academia, bully romance, '80s high school, professor romance, a girl undercover at an all-boys boarding school. Make readers relive first days, forbidden crushes, and secrets passed between classes.
🏫 Ivy-covered lecture halls or fluorescent-lit locker rooms, midnight initiations or Saturday detention, rivals sharing a dorm room. If it happens at school, it belongs in this contest.
📅 Submission Deadline: November 21, 2026 at 23:59 PM PST
Story inspiration
- A scholarship student infiltrates an elite academy's secret society and falls for the one person she was sent to expose.
- The academy's golden boy and the scholarship student he torments are assigned as roommates for the year.
- A girl goes undercover at an all-boys boarding school, and keeping her secret gets harder every day, especially around her roommate.
What you win
🥇 1st Place
- A Galatea publishing contract offer
- $300 USD
- Social media spotlight across Inkitt platforms
- Inkitt VIP Badge
- Contest Winner badge for your book cover
- Feature on @inkittbooks Instagram
🥈 2nd Place
- $150 USD
- Social media spotlight across Inkitt platforms
- Inkitt VIP Badge
- Contest Winner badge for your book cover
- Feature on @inkittbooks Instagram
🥉 3rd Place
- $50 USD
- Social media spotlight across Inkitt platforms
- Inkitt VIP Badge
- Contest Winner badge for your book cover
- Feature on @inkittbooks Instagram
Contest Terms
Contest Dates
- Start: August 21, 2026
- End: November 21, 2026 at 11:59 PM PST
Entry Guidelines
✅ Entry is free!
✅ Publish your story on Inkitt and submit via the contest page or your work settings.
✅ Minimum 20,000 words by the deadline
✅ No maximum word limit
✅ Stories must be original (no plagiarism)
✅ Stories MUST be set in a school to be eligible: college, boarding school, academy, conservatory, or training camp, in any era. Romance should be central to the story.
✅ Explicit sex scenes are allowed when the book is correctly age-rated
✅ Multiple entries allowed (only one story per author can win)
✅ New stories only - the entry must be a new story, started and published on Inkitt on or after August 6, 2026
✅ Paid-tier subscription stories are eligible
❌ Previously published, previously completed or already-ongoing stories are not eligible
❌ Entries already signed/published on Galatea or part of a signed series are ineligible
❌ Fanfiction and poetry are not eligible
Age Rating & Title Guidelines
- Titles must be suitable for all audiences.
- Mature/age-restricted content is allowed if correctly labeled.
- Other mature themes such as violence, strong language, or sensitive topics are permitted if appropriately labeled.
Winner Announcement / Payment / Selection
- Winners will be announced within 4 weeks of the contest end date on Inkitt’s Instagram and the Inkitt Winners Page.
- Winners will be paid the month following their selection.
- Winner selection is determined by Inkitt’s algorithm, analyzing reader behaviors when interacting with your book.
