I'm sure each judge has their criteria, but I'll share some of my thoughts:

1) Is it presented professionally? Or are the opening paragraphs littered with poor punctuation, spelling and spacing? If a story is clearly not edited, I doubt I'll get more than a paragraph or two into it before I go cross-eyed and lose all interest, no matter how poetically it may be written.

2) Is it a story? This is my third year judging stories for Prep and while I have read many well-written interior monologues as a character strolls through darkened streets and reflects on who they are and why they do the things they do, I usually do not put those in my top 5 picks. My top picks are stories, with character interactions, dialogue and a plot, that really allow me to see the character in action.

3) Does it pique my interest? The goal of the exercise is to have my root for your character. I should come away from the story with an understanding of who your character is. I should feel capable of picking up a character sheet and filling in parts of it (not necessarily their hair color or how tall they are, but perhaps whether they're serious or silly, optimistic or pessimistic). Most of all, I should want to pick up your novel and read more about them.