Eligible Projects
The Realm Awards honor the best in speculative storytelling across multiple media. The contest began solely for novels, but has expanded for 2025. Media types we judge include:
- Novels
- Short stories
- Audiobooks
- Cover Art
- Interactive Media (narrative video games)
- Comics/Sequential Art
- For more information on each category, click here.
Publication Date
Entries must have been published in the previous calendar year—either traditionally or independently.
Because the submissions open on December 15th, submissions will be from the same year as the start of the submission period. For example: books submitted from December 15, 2024 to January 21, 2025 should have a 2024 publication date.
Subsequent editions and/or republications are not eligible. This includes books that were independently published in a previous year but then published by a traditional publisher in the contest year.
Both eBooks and print editions qualify, but the earliest publication date of any format is used to determine eligibility.
Audio books may be entered in the year they were released even if the eBook or print edition was published in a prior year.
Cover art for a subsequent edition of a previously published book may be entered into the Cover Design category.
For short fiction, if the work was part of a collection or anthology, or published as an online it is still eligible for consideration in the year it was first published.
Authorship
Submissions must be the work of Christian creators.
Does that mean it must have an obvious Christian message? Absolutely not. It means the author will need to agree to our Statement of Faith. We’re looking for amazing speculative projects by Christians. That’s it.
Both publishers and authors can submit their books into the contest, but every author must acknowledge our Statement of Faith.
For the Cover Design, Audio, Graphic Novel, Sequential Art, Interactive Media, the artists and narrator(s) do not have to be Christian, but the author must acknowledge our Statement of Faith. If you are submitting on the behalf of an author, please be able to affirm the Statement of Faith with confidence.
Realm Makers Faith Statement
We believe…
We believe in the Holy Scriptures as originally given by God: divinely inspired, infallible, and entirely trustworthy.
We believe there is one God, eternally existent in three persons: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
We believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, God manifest in the flesh, and in His virgin birth, His sinless human life, His divine miracles, His vicarious and atoning death, His bodily resurrection, His ascension, His mediatorial work, and His personal return in power and glory.
We believe in the salvation of lost and sinful man only through the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, by whose indwelling the believer is enabled to live a holy life, to witness and work for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Content
Books with mature content will be accepted, but gratuitous content could result in disqualification at our judges’ sole discretion.
No erotica. No gratuitous gore. No glorification of violence or other flagrant sin.
Submission Period
Submissions for the awards open on December 15th and run until January 21, at 12 midnight (EST).
Recipient
Unless otherwise directed, we will give/send the physical award for any winner to the individual who submitted the entry.
For example, if you are an author submitting an audiobook, but you want the award to go to the narrator, please email awards@realmmakers.com to make us aware upon submitting your entry.