FAQs

Fees & Payment

The competition entry fee is $77 (inc. GST) per team.

Each team must raise $240 minimum in sponsorship for the book to the eligible for judging and to appear on the Online Library.

Pay the entry fee of $77 (inc. GST) at least one week before your chosen writing day to ensure you are emailed the parameters for the competition.

The sponsorship minimum of $240 must be received by The Kids’ Cancer Project by 9pm AEST 30 September 2024 for the team to be eligible for judging.

There are 3 ways to pay the entry fee.

1) Credit card via www.writeabookinaday.com in the Team Coordinator portal

2) Direct deposit to:

Account Name: The Kids’ Cancer Project
BSB: 032010 Westpac
Account No: 291311

Please include school name, writers group or corporate name in full as reference. If you have multiple team entries, please advise by email to [email protected]  how the payment in to be allocated.

3) Cheque and money orders to:

The Kids’ Cancer Project

Write a Book in a Day
PO Box 6400
Alexandria
NSW 2015

Please include school name, writers group or corporate name in full as reference. If you have multiple team entries, please advise by email to [email protected]  how the payment in to be allocated.

Please do not send cash payments.

Invoices can be generated through the Team Coordinator portal on the Write a Book in a Day website if required.

About the Competition

Please email [email protected] or telephone the Write a Book in a Day team on 1800 651 158 or (02) 8394 7711.

All registration fees and money raised during Write a Book in a Day will directly fund vital childhood cancer research projects via The Kids’ Cancer Project.

Please review the competition Terms and Conditions here

How to register

A new registration is required every year. Register here.

Complete the registration form for your school or writing group and upon registration, you will receive an email with your Team Coordinator login details.

You can access your Team Coordinator portal through the Team Coordinator login. Here you will add your teams, generate parameters and submit your book. You can also generate an invoice, pay fees and download your team/s participation certificates.

As many as you like!

You can enter multiple teams under one registration. There must be only one registration per school/group. Please consult with other staff at your school or members of your group to ensure there is only one registration. 

Upload your book as a PDF and plain text via the Submit Book tab on the Team Coordinator login.  If you have difficulty uploading the book, please email the Write a Book in a Day team at [email protected] or call 02 8394 7711.

Plain Text is required for the book upload as this information goes through an online ‘parser’ to help with judging the books.

Use either of the below methods to turn your book document into plain text and note, plain text will strip out any formatting and pictures and leave you with text only document.

Method 1 

  1. open the document in Word,
  2. do a “select all” (ctrl+A),
  3. “copy” (ctrl+C),
  4. open Notepad (found in Start > All Programs > Accessories),
  5. “paste” (ctrl+V) the content into Notepad,
  6. save the file

Method 2

  1. open the document in Word,
  2. do a “Save as” in Word (goto File > Save as),
  3. select “Save as type” as “plain text”,
  4. click “Save”,
  5. when the dialogue box appears (for non-English OSs) check “allow character substitution” and then click “OK”

If you have difficulty saving as plain text, please call us on 02 8394 7711 and  email the book to [email protected] 

After the books are judged they will be available on the Online Library. The Online Library is shared with hospitals across Australia for children and families undergoing treatment.

Please note, only books that are eligible for judging will be published to the Online Library. This means, only Teams that have paid their entry fee ($70) and met the minimum sponsorship requirement ($240) by 30 September 2024 will have their books published online.

The Kids’ Cancer Project will have a non-exclusive right to publish copies of the book from each team for a period of two years. Should any of the books in the competition be published in any form or by any person (whether The Kids’ Cancer Project or otherwise), 50% of the royalties of that publication for a period of 2 years shall be paid to the The Kids’ Cancer Project fund and 50% to the copyright owner(s). In the absence of any other written agreement, all members of the team that wrote, illustrated, or otherwise contributed to the book will own copyright equally.

Key dates

Key dates for 2025 competition:

  • Registration opens, 1 May 2025
  • Writing starts, 1 June 2025
  • Choose any day to write from 1 June 2025 until 30 September 2025
  • Last day to register, 29 September 2025
  • Last day to write, 30 September 2025
  • Sponsorship closes 9pm AEST, 30 September 2025 (for purposes of judging and prizes)
  • Winners announced, November 2025

Final judging will take place in November. Winners will be notified by email and listed in the Results section of this website.

After an initial round of judging, a short list of finalists will be notified in October. Finalists will be notified by email and winners listed here on this website in the Results section. Winners are announced in November.

Team Information

Any team member under the age of 18 needs permission from a parent or guardian to participate and fundraise for Write a Book in a Day. A Parent Permission Letter template is available here, Resources.

Teams may enter the competition in one of the following Divisions:

  • Primary School – Years 5-6
  • Middle Secondary School  – Years 7-9
  • Upper Secondary School – Years 10-12
  • Open – 18 years and over

Teams from Primary School Years K to 4 are not eligible to enter due to the demands of the competition.

For school teams, the year group of the majority of team members determines their Division, eg a team with seven Year 9 students and two Year 10 students would enter the Middle Secondary School Division.

Each book must be written and illustrated by a team of writers.

  • The minimum number of team members is five (5).
  • The maximum number of team members is ten (10).

Getting ready to write

Your story must be based on and primarily written around five parameters. These parameters will be: two human characters, one non-human character, a setting and an issue. The story may include secondary characters and settings but the parameters are the key components.

For school teams, an email will be sent at 12 noon the business day prior to writing, directing Team Coordinators to the portal to download parameters. For open teams, an email will be sent at 3pm the weekday prior to the writing day. 

Your team will also be assigned five random words to be included anywhere in the story. They must be included as written and without adaptation, eg “free” must be written as “free”, not “freely”, “freedom”, etc.

The random words are the same for every team in the competition. Please write the random words in bold type to highlight their inclusion in the story.

All books must be written within a consecutive 12-hour period (one day) during the competition period of 1 June to 30 September 2025.

Writing can start from 8am (local time) and must finish by 8pm (local time). Books are to be uploaded by 9pm (local time).

Remember, every word counts! This includes your cover, title page, back page, blurb and everything in between! The word count for your story must be within the limit for your Division. Books outside the limits will not be eligible for judging.

  • Primary School Division – 1500 to 2500 words
  • Middle Secondary School Division – 3500 to 5000 words
  • Upper Secondary School Division – 3500 to 5000 words
  • Open Categories – 7000 to 10000 words