Premio Scerbanenco - 12th edition

SCERBANENCO@LIGNANO AWARD 2026: The 12th Edition Is Underway

Cecilia and Germana Scerbanenco, in collaboration with the City of Lignano Sabbiadoro, the Municipal Library, Il Messaggero Veneto, and Il Giallo Mondadori, announce the 12th edition of the Scerbanenco@Lignano Award. The literary competition pays homage to the great writer Giorgio Scerbanenco, who has historically been associated with the Friulian town.

How to enter

The award is open to unpublished mystery and/or noir stories in Italian.

Maximum length: 10,000 characters (including spaces).
Submission method: Email only to scerbanenco@lignano.org by the deadline.
Submission requirements: The text must be anonymous. The email must include the author's information (name, surname, date of birth, address, and telephone number) and a photo/scan of the signed Certificate of Participation (cut from a 2025 or 2026 issue of Il Giallo Mondadori).
Limits: Only one story per participant; pseudonyms are prohibited. Participation is free.
Deadline for submissions: July 25, 2026

Jury and prizes

The stories will be evaluated by a jury of experts chaired by Cecilia Scerbanenco.

1st Place: Prize of €1,000.00, publication in the Il Giallo Mondadori series and in the print edition of Il Messaggero Veneto.
2nd and 3rd Place: Online publication in Il Messaggero Veneto.
Additional Selections: The submitted stories may be included in a collection edited especially for the occasion.

The award ceremony will be held on Saturday, September 5th, at the Lignano Sabbiadoro Municipal Library.

Lignano Sabbiadoro is the city that Scerbanenco chose, after discovering it as a tourist, as his home for several years, establishing a strong bond that continues today through the presence of his daughter Cecilia, curator of her father's work and of the Giorgio Scerbanenco Archive (books, objects, documents, letters, manuscripts) housed in the Municipal Library.