We are thrilled to announce that the winner of the 2022 4thWrite Short Story Prize, in association with the Guardian, is Olivia Douglass with their story, Ink. Read the story here.

Ink 

In the midst of her unease, a young woman encounters a childhood friend. Memories of a shared secret begin to unravel as she confronts old shame and new desire. 

Olivia (they/them) is a British-Nigerian writer from London, West Somerset & Wiltshire. They are the author of the poetry pamphlet Slow Tongue (self-published 2018) and were shortlisted for the Rebecca Swift Foundation Women Poets’ Prize 2020. A Barbican Young Poets alumni, their writing has appeared in publications including Bath Magg, Montez Press and Nothing Personal. Olivia is currently an MSt Creative Writing student at The University of Oxford and is working on their first novel.

Prize judge Catherine Cho said Ink was “accomplished in its precision, and in the way it captures the nostalgia and heartbreak of a single encounter, and the way the past haunts our present”.

As winner, Olivia receives £1,000, a one-day workshop with 4th Estate editorial, publicity and marketing teams, and his story published on the Guardian website.

Find Olivia on Twitter @_oliviadouglass and Instagram @oliviaddouglass.

Special Commendation

A special commendation from the judges goes to Dionne McCulloch and her story End of the World. Read it here.

End of the World

A woman is distressed after her dog kills a deer, but it’s a bystander’s cruel reaction that causes her the most pain.

Dionne is a writer and editor currently living in Bath, England. It takes her three full minutes to answer the question ‘Where are you from?’

Prize judge Justine Jordan said the writing of End of the World was “beautifully assured, addressing the eruption of violence into everyday life – whether that’s a dog attacking a deer, or racism at the school gates – with stunning control”.

Find Dionne on Twitter @DionneMcCulloch and Instagram @dionne_mcculloch.

The Shortlist

Read the rest of the shortlisted stories now via the links below.

Ruksana Abdul-Majid – Sairish

Ruksana is a writer from Sheffield. She has a PhD in English Literature from the University of Sheffield, and worked for many years in education. Currently a carer, in 2020 she was awarded a Northern Writers’ Debut Award for her work-in-progress, the novel My Family, and other Tragedies. 

Sairish 

In the story ‘Sairish’, a child domestic worker from North Pakistan deals with the aftermath of a wedding in the household she serves.

Vanessa Ezeh – Plenty Meat

Vanessa is a writer of science fiction/fantasy, romantic comedy and coming-of-age novels for teens and adults. A South London native, when she isn’t at her day job, she is either writing, editing, or producing music. Find Vanessa on Twitter @levaudevillianv and Instagram @queenvthesag.

Plenty Meat 

Plenty Meat tells the story of a tense encounter between a house girl and her mistress, and what happens when you work in the house of Pastor John Folabi. 

Rachel Imrie – Half a Clementine

Rachel was born in Glasgow to a Chinese mother and Scottish father. She graduated with a BA in History from the University of Cambridge last year and now works in book publishing. Her writing has previously appeared in Bad Form Review.  Find Rachel on Twitter @rachkimrie.

Half a Clementine  

Sharing and starving, clashing and coming together once again, Half a Clementine unpeels the fraught relationship between mother and daughter.

Zui Kumar-Reddy – Kamal and the Bad Superimposition

Zui is the first Sonny Mehta India Scholarship Awardee at the University of East Anglia MA Creative Writing Program (2022). She is currently working on her debut novel ‘The Generation of Light’ that explores transcendence across class, caste, gender, race and mortality. Find Zui on Twitter @ZuiKumarreddy and Instagram @zui.666.

Kamal and the Bad Superimposition   

A middle-aged, middle-class physics professor from Bangalore, India wakes up one morning to find his psyche has split in two because of his inability to merge his rational reality with his yearning for another one.