The 2025 Hope Prize Longlist
This year we received 2501 entries from writers in over 60 countries. The competition was extraordinary with so many powerful, beautifully crafted stories about hope, courage, and resilience.
These 81 stories moved us.
We are so proud to announce the 2025 Hope Prize Longlist, and so grateful to each and every writer who trusted us with their work.
The shortlist and winners will be announced Monday 30 March.
Adesuwa Agbonile — An Ehi Speaks
Nazia Akhtar — The Letter
Celeste Amidon — Please Don't Tell
Clare Atkins — Babygirl's bike
Ellem Austin — People Like Us
Christine Bernard — Missed Moments
Hannah Bishop — The Curse
Silas Blackwell — The Hunt Below Rain Hill
Janne Bowen — Illumination
Terri Bootsman — Dragons and Dandelions
Julia Brieger — The Flooding
Kate Brooks — If on a Winter's Night a Waitress
Ursula Brunetti — Swallows
Nathalie Buvet — Pilgrimage
Clare Carter — Nesting
Rosa Cass — Sisters in the Morning
Jamie Chipperfield — Other People's Shoes
Jake Cullen — The Librarian Formerly Known as Prince
Cee Em — In The Key of Mothers
Johann de Waal — Snow
Arianna Duncan — If You Stay Very Still
Zoe Dulay-Peña — The Adoration of All These Lives
Susanna Elliffe — Patron Saints of Road Kill
Jessica Faulkner — Aurelie
Camille Goering — Back Door Blues
Selina Graham — Bog Butter
Jodie Haid — Black Dog
Elisa Hall — The Blood Pact
Kingsley Iheme — The Boy Who Lived Twice
E. F. Johnson — Sore Afraid
Helen Jones — The Spider
Cheryl Jorgensen — A Consequence of Shrapnel
Cate Kennedy — Eleven Days and One Hour
Joshua Kemp — The Last Blue Mallet on Earth
Zachary Lassen — The Cormorant
M. E. Lawrence — Narcissus, South of Langemarck
Claire Low — Over My Dead Body
Marie Low — Under the Fig
J.R. Lowe — How to Slay a Dragon
Jeannie Mackenzie — A History of Loss in Fifteen Domestic Objects
Shaun McMahon — Blue Door
Ciera McElroy — Still Life
Ellen McQueen — The Baby Shower
Seán McNicholl — A Dandelion By Any Other Name
Dan Micklethwaite — Like Everest Maybe, or El Capitan
Dot Mikaelian — The Dyson
Olive Miller — Home
Joy Molan — Red Dirt Running
Celeste Mohammed — Plenty Time
Niall Murphy — Point of No Return
Yanik Ncube — Lost Mary
Hannah Nickels — Silver Things
Chidera Nwume — How To Talk
Travis Oltmann — The Last Days of Raymond Roussel
Mónica Ibarra Parle — Little Angels
Annika Pavlin-Jamal — Bummer Lamb
Erin Pearce — The Glass Parade
Jyothi Kiran Pisipatti — The Still Flow of Water
Demi Poulos — Other Lives
Honni van Rijswijk — The Magpie Season
Ronan Ryan — Ghoul
Najeeb S.A. — The Resonance of Small Things
Trina Saffioti — Never Talking to Island Boys Again
Josephine Sarvaas — Lost in the Woods
Jennifer Shepherd — Revelation River
Kasimir Skinner — Chasing Daylight
Christopher Smith — Your Compliance is Required
Caroline Söderlund — The Pond Mermaid
Natalie Southworth — Ash
Ben Stones — The Tide at Calahonda
Yaro Stowell — Samsara
Claire Tafoya — Laurel of the Canyon
Monica Tanos — The Bath
Monica Tanos — Subterranea
Attar Topobroto — The Small Miracles of Aditya Subroto
Sumanya Velamur — The Anointing
Heleen Wagemans — The Street of a Thousand Loaves
Padraic Walsh — Adagio in the Shadows
Hilary White — Winter song
Judith Wilson — Marked in the Margins
Alison Woodhouse — Our Boy
