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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#223: Academia

A recent re-watch of Gilmore Girls has had me thinking about academic life — there’s something uniquely compelling in the combination of idolized institutions, tweed, the pursuit of knowledge, and thousands of young people all living in close quarters. I’m not alone: dark academia is an established genre by now.

This week, let’s step into the halls of ivy together — I’ve got academics, libraries, students, and exams in these prompts, so whether your imaginary life in the academy is dark, fantastical, suspenseful, or humorous, I hope you’ll find a prompt that feels right.

This week's prompts

Start your story with a student discovering a hidden room in a university library.

Mystery – 77 stories

Write about two rival academics pursuing the same grant.

Character – 14 stories

Write a story in which a jaded academic makes an unexpected, rash decision.

Angst – 41 stories

Write about a student reporter uncovering a university scandal.

Mystery – 22 stories

Set your story during exam season, when tensions run high and a minor incident sends your protagonist into a panic spiral.

Character – 30 stories

Stories

“Library of Secrets” by Luciano Cortese

Submitted to Contest #223

It was quite a thing to say that you’d practically grown up in the city’s biggest library and archives. Quail could still remember his younger years right after being adopted, as he tentatively explored the halls and wandered between bookshelves, checked maps, tried to find everything he could here. The King Library and Archives was a mysterious place, full of hoarded knowledge and forgotten things. If you were looking for secrets, you’d find plenty exploring its five floors, big enough to take up an entire city block and yet still seeming b...

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“The Awakened” by Kelly Mesenbrink

Submitted to Contest #223

“Ugh,” Hanna uttered under her breath. Her laptop charger had escaped the wall outlet yet again, as it had four times before that same day. Or was it night? She could not tell. As far as she was concerned, the library was her home now, its grayish-tan walls and dusty bookshelves emitting a strangely hospitable aura. Stretching like a contortionist, she maneuvered the plug back into the inconveniently-placed wall outlet. The charging light turned orange, and Hanna leaned back in her chair and sighed in relief. She looked at her watch...

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“Lukes meaning” by Max Hendrickson

Submitted to Contest #223

Prologue The book was an ordinary affair, brown worn spine with faded lettering, sitting amongst other drab works of olive and maroon. But to Luke, it was as though the book was a bright copper in a pile of bits. Something about the book spoke to him, whispering secrets in his ear as though it would tell him all he wanted to know and more. He stood in the middle of the library's east wing, duster clutched in hand, among the towering shelves of dusty tomes. And here in the farthest reaches of the library, against the very back...

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“Binding Lessons” by Angel Oquendo

Submitted to Contest #223

Two students walked along the shadows of Old Queen’s Way, the great statue loomed over much of the 10 mile courtyard, overlooking the mess hall, gymnasium, and the dormitory. One walked with an awkward gait leading his colleague to raise an eyebrow. “Herkal, you alright? You look like you shit yourself”, he said. The other man looked at him with a weak, embarrassed smile, “Huh? Oh yeah, these new pants were made poorly. Too tight in the waist”. New pants huh?, he thought. Herkal had them for nigh on half a year which made an alre...

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“Wayback When” by Jesse Baron

Submitted to Contest #223

I can't get my body to be still. My foot continues to tap to the beat of my twitching eye. Couple that with my rebellious mind with thoughts like starving vultures. They prey on my worry and ever growing anxiety. Funny enough my surroundings suit my countenance. In a universities library,pass midnight and stressed out;I am no different from any other student. Although every other student doesn't have to catch up on almost a whole year of work like me. It's hopeless,this feeling festers as I page through all the options to make up credits. I ...

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“The Book Brigade” by Sophia Torresan

Submitted to Contest #223

All was dark but the poor ochre light from a single bulb. Raindrops collected on the window, the street outside illuminated by the roadside lamps. It was useless trying to study now, and Maria-Jo’s eyes were beginning to strain. She stretched out in a sigh, enjoying the delicious silence in the Heidelberg university library, certain she was the last there. Conscious that her Grossvater may be waiting up, she deftly placed her books in her satchel, fastened her coat and turned off the light. There was still a dim glow of light from downstairs...

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“The Spider and the Gerbil” by Steve Rogers

Submitted to Contest #223

“You can say what you like about those Australians but they certainly know how to make a big red and no mistake:”Professor Jim Lucas and Professor Belinda Conti had been firm friends for the full twenty-five years of their tenure at the University. And on this early summer’s evening they were to be found, as is often the case, sharing a reasonably priced but very acceptable bottle of Australian Shiraz in the University bar at the end of a, not too exhausting, day. They would delight in railing against the students, railing against the Vice C...

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“The Grant of Fernandez” by Nidhi Santhosh

Submitted to Contest #223

“And the award for Best Research this year goes to Professor Fernandez & Professor Smith!” My smile fades as quickly as it came, and I fight to keep my expression composed as I ascend the stage, accepting my plaque with pursed lips. In fact, it takes everything I have to bite my tongue when he stands beside me with a plaque just like mine, without doing even half the work. He can fool them all, but he can’t fool me. He hasn’t lifted a finger with his lab assistants, just let them run everything, while I’ve been sweating till my socks to ...

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“Rattle the Bones” by 𝔊𝔲𝔞𝔡𝔞𝔩𝔲𝔭𝔢 𝔗𝔢𝔩𝔠𝔬𝔫𝔱𝔞𝔯

Submitted to Contest #223

The bones have been lying hidden for much time—decades, a millenia, or more, depending on who is questioned. It matters not how long. Time is meaningless to these bones that once made up living creatures. Now these bones which have been lying hidden for so long are being sought and squabbled over. Edward Drinker Cope, son of a well-to-do quaker farmer, strides across a fossil quarry in Haddonfield, New Jersey, near his home. Following him is his friend Othniel Charles Marsh. Othniel is nine years Edward’s senior. They met in G...

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“The Modern Pandora” by Julia Hanson

Submitted to Contest #223

Dear Maggie, I know it has been years since I’ve been in touch. The last few years have been filled with triumph, but more often tragedy. I need to tell someone and, despite the time passed, you are my closest friend and I can think of no better confessor. What I have to tell you is strange beyond your present imagining. I ask only that you read to the end. As you know, after graduation I took a faculty position at Waterford University. The first six months were a whirlwind, all my attention and energy were focused on learning a new depa...

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“Jacob's Message” by Bob Long Jr

Submitted to Contest #223

David loved watching old episodes of the 1960s sitcom Gilligan's Island with his dad. Ginger was beautiful but Mary Ann, well, he wanted to marry her! She was so pretty, so sweet and kind. Who would have thought one of those characters would have served as a role model for what he wanted to be when he grew up. Not a ship mate or a ship captain, not a movie star or even a millionaire. No, he wanted to be a Professor. The professor was admired, smart, handsome, well dressed, and always seemed to be doing some kind of research. He gav...

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“Porters Past” by Shannon Zornow

Submitted to Contest #223

I walked slowly to class, tired from grading papers late last night. I checked my watch, there was 10 minutes left until my 8:30pm class. It didn’t matter because they’d all be late anyways. I felt empty walking through the halls, as if I was watching from deep inside my body, as my legs moved of their own accord. I didn’t even stop when I got to where I taught. Opening the door easily, I rarely locked it. Not many kids took my class anyways. Stepping in to look at the empty room. I took a deep breath, and it felt like my hop...

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“The tale of the Wilk, the Lemon and the university slumlord ” by Mike Ramsey

Submitted to Contest #223

Ashley Lemon looked at me across the battered desk in her East Quad office with distaste. I couldn't believe how power drunk she had become. This dingy hole -- home to The Post -- had become her throne room. I didn't really care at the time when the staff had voted her to be managing editor over me. I never wanted the extra unpaid hours added to my week anyway. But Lemon had seized her office with relish, and seemed to be cosplaying the managing editor from The Wall Street Journal, issuing commands and icy stares in equal measures. It ...

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“Smooth Criminals” by J Doucette

Submitted to Contest #223

POWERSCHOOL, Thank you, thank you very much. I know my daughter is smart. She is indeed. Must get it from her mother. She has an associates degree from the VET TECH INSTITUTE OF PITTSBURGH, 3.8 GPA. A NURSING DIPLOMA FROM LENAPE TECH SCHOOL OF NURSING, IN FORD CITY PA, VALEDICTORIAN 2018. 3.8 GPA. THE ONLY CLASS THAT STOPPED HER FROM ACHIEVING THE 4.0 SHE DESIRED? NURSING LEADERSHIP. HER FINAL COURSE OF STUDY. HER ONLY B PLUS. SHE MISSED IT BY A PERCENTAGE. SHE EVEN GOT 100% ON HER FIRST ATI TEST THAT SHE TOOK AT THAT SCHOOL. HER MOTH...

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“A Step Too Far” by Andrea Crocker

Submitted to Contest #223

By late afternoon, word was buzzing around the hallways at Cedar High. Another student had gone missing. As a budding journalist, this kind of news would usually perk my ears. And Jack, the school paper’s editor, had been breathing down my neck to get the scoop. But today, I couldn't keep my mind off of Antoine. We had been the best of friends since middle school and I knew him better than most. So, when I say he had been acting strangely the last several days, I mean st...

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$250

Prize money

184

Contest entries

84

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Nov 10, 2023 EST

Won by AnneMarie Miles 🏆

Title: Cerulean

Submissions must be between 1,000 - 3,000 words and will be approved and published on Reedsy Prompts within 7 days of the contest closing.

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