This site is available for anyone to use.
Maybe you’re a parent seeking new stories for keen kids or perhaps you’re a grandparent who would like to pass on the stories you were told as a child.
This site is perfect for people who want to find new stories or post stories when inspiration strikes.
There is no restriction on an author's age, so if your child wishes to write their own story, please encourage them. However, we do not condone the unmonitored use of a user's account by anyone other than the account holder. You will need to be over 18 to open an account and we insist that it is the owner of the account who submits stories (see Who can write stories?). Only those with a user account will be able to use the communication facilities on the website.
For information on your child and the safe use of the Internet, we recommend the ThinkUKnow website by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) in the UK.
Simply click on the Login / Register link at the top of the page.
The registration form will ask you for a few basic details and you can insert the names of your children if you want them to star in the short stories you purchase (See Who are the Stars?).
When complete, you will be sent an email asking you to confirm that you wish to join. Simply click on the link in that email to activate your account. If you haven't received the email after a few minutes, please check your junk mail filters.
Should you have any problems, please do not hesitate to Contact Us.
Whether you are buying or selling, you will need to register (see How do I register?). The registration process is completely free. You will need to have some credits if you wish to purchase stories, which can be obtained by selling stories that you have written or buying a package of credits using either a credit card or paypal account.
To buy a story, you will need to buy credits at a rate of 1 penny per credit. There is a minimum spend of £2.50 upon registration which will be converted into 200 credits (there is a 50p paypal charge for the cheapest package).
The Stars are the children to whom these short stories will be read. Authors are able to write their stories to personalise up to five male and five female stars (see How do I personalise my story?). You can choose these names when you register, and edit them at any stage from the My Profile section.
Every time you open a personalised story, it checks your Stars list, so you can update your list to fit the story. If you wish to switch the names around for a particular story, go to My Profile and select Update Your Profile. This page will allow you to change your current Stars list. When you have edited the names, click Update then re-open the story and the names of the characters will have changed.
No-one else can see your Stars list.
When you register on this site for free, you will automatically have a My Profile page.
You can write a little about yourself, upload a profile photo, edit your details, write a blog and leave feedback for authors and other site users.
My Profile gives you an overview of your transaction history. You can buy credits there and see a list of the stories you have purchased.
If you’re also a writer, you will see a list of the stories you have written and sold on the site and you can withdraw credits you have earned from selling your stories.
If you wish to buy stories from Sparkling Stories, you must register with the site then purchase credits. Credits cost 1p each. The minimum purchase is 200 credits for £2.50.
Credits are used rather than cash to reduce transaction costs and make the site even better value for money. Without them, stories would be more expensive, and the authors could lose a significant amount of their income.
If you’re only wish to write stories, there is no need to purchase credits.
There are several ways of finding a story on Sparkling Stories. If you click All Stories on the menu at the top of every page, you will see a list of categories in which you can browse. You can look through all of the stories that have been written on this page, or click a category to refine your hunt. If you are after something more specific, try clicking on the List View link on each category page. From there you can see far more stories per page, and filter the list by any combination of title, suggested age, votes and price.
The default Browse View, and the more focused List View are a great ways to find a story from a particular genre, but to be more specific, use the search box on the righthand-side of the screen. The search facility will find all stories that have particular words in them. So, if you are trying to find a story on a particular topic, this may be your best way of locating it.
Should you find a story that you don't think is suitable due to language, plagiarism, content, breach of copyright etc, please click the 'Report this Story' link on the story page. You will then be able to complete a form that will be sent to the administrator for immediate consideration. Your comments will then be reviewed by our panel. If the complaint is upheld, the article will be barred, the author warned about future conduct and the complainant will have their fee refunded.
No, not at all. We hope that all children are lucky enough to be surrounded by books during their childhood. But keeping up with children’s appetites for new stories can be expensive.
Sparkling Stories offers another way to access children’s literature in an affordable way. It also allows you to try out new authors and to see if your children like them, before investing in a book or series of books.
If you still have any unanswered questions, please Contact Us.
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