Writing Competition: Bartleby Snopes 8th Annual Dialogue Only Contest

Bartleby Snopes 8th Annual Dialogue Only Contest begins on June 1, 2016. All initial submissions up to 2,000 words must be received by September 15, 2016 Winners will be announced by October 19, 2016.

 

Compose a short story entirely of dialogue with no narration or tag lines for one $10 fee. No editors or judges receive any portion of the entry fees. Our contest runs with a rolling rejection process. We will always keep our five favorite stories. Contestants will be notified immediately if their story falls out of the top five and have the opportunity to resubmit.

 

A minimum of $500 will be awarded, with at least $300 going to the grand prize winner. Our five finalists will also appear in Issue 15 of the magazine. For every entry over 50, an additional $5 will be added to the total prize money. Last year we awarded $1,900 with a $1,161 grand prize. 

 

We welcome Kathy Fish & Rebecca McDowell as the 2016 judges. No previously published work or simultaneous submissions permitted. All rights revert back to the author after publication.

 

Go to our website for more information, previous years’ winning stories & to submit.

Writing Competition: 2017 Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival Writing Contests

We are excited to announce that the 2017 Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival's Writing Contests are now open for submissions!

FICTION

• For our Fiction Contest the deadline is November 30, 2016. Entry Fee is $25 

• Grand Prize: $1,500

• Domestic airfare (up to $500) and French Quarter accommodations to attend the Festival

• VIP All-Access Festival pass for the next Festival ($500 value) 

• Public reading at a literary panel at the next Festival

• Publication in Louisiana Literature 

 Judge: Dorothy Allison, Lambda Literary Award-winning and New York Times-bestselling author of acclaimed novel, Cavedweller.

POETRY

• For our Poetry Contest the deadline is November 15, 2016. Entry Fee is $15.

• Grand Prize: $1,000

• VIP All-Access Pass ($500 value) for the Festival 

• Publication in Louisiana Cultural Vistas Magazine

• Public reading at the next Festival

Judge: Peter Cooley, Louisiana Poet Laureate and author of nine poetry collections including his latest, Night Bus to the Afterlife.

ONE-ACT PLAY

• For our One-Act Play Contest the deadline is November 1, 2016. Entry Fee is $25.

• Grand Prize: $1,500 

• Professional Staged Reading at the next Festival

• A VIP All-Access Festival pass ($500 value) 

• Publication in Bayou Magazine

Judge: University of New Orleans’ Creative Writing Workshop and the Department of Film, Theatre, and Communication Arts.

Top nine finalists for all contests will receive a panel pass ($75 value) to the Festival (March 22-26, 2017), and their names will be published on the Festival's website. For more information and full guidelines, see our submission page.

In addition, the Saints and Sinners Festival, an LGBT literary festival held in conjunction with TWF, has a Fiction contest. This year, the judge is Michael Thomas Ford. Prizes include $500 for the winner, two $100 finalist awards, publication, and a public reading. The deadline is October 3, 2016. Full guidelines available here.

Poetry Chapbook Competition: Boaat Chapbook Prize

Submit to the BOAAT CHAPBOOK PRIZE!

 

Now open for submissions through July 15, 2016

 

GUEST JUDGE: Richard Siken

 

Richard Siken is an American poet, painter, filmmaker, and an editor at Spork Press. He is a recipient of two Arizona Commission on the Arts grants, two Lannan Residency Fellowships, and a Literature Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts. Richard is the author of the collection Crush (Yale University Press, 2005), which won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Competition in 2004, and War of the Foxes (Copper Canyon Press, 2015).

 

ENTRY FEE: $17

 

GUIDELINES:

• poets writing in the English language are eligible 

 

• poets are not eligible to submit a manuscript if they know the judge or the BOAAT Chapbook Editors personally

 

• chapbook manuscripts should be 15 to 30 pages of poetry, submitted in .docx or PDF formats only

 

• poems previously published in journals are acceptable—be sure to include an acknowledgements page if appropriate

 

• please include a title page, table of contents, but do not include your name anywhere within the manuscript

 

• the author's biography is collected separately in the Submittable cover letter

 

• simultaneous submissions are permissible, but submitters are asked to notify BOAAT Press immediately if a manuscript is picked up for publication elsewhere

 

• manuscript revisions are not permitted during the submission period

 

• submitting multiple manuscripts is fine with entry fees for each

 

READING PROCESS: Every single entry is read blind by our team of editors. They will select twenty-five of the best chapbook manuscripts to send our judge. You can download past winning chapbooks for free here.

 

PUBLICATION FOR THE WINNING CHAPBOOK:

 

• a $1,000 honorarium

 

• 25 printed chapbooks out of a first print-run of 250 (with ISBN)

 

• 5 handmade chapbooks out of a limited edition printing of 50 

 

• publication slated for Spring/Summer 2017

 

FINALISTS: We usually choose between 1 - 4 finalists. Each finalist will receive a $50 honorarium and their chapbooks will be added to our website's PDF chapbook catalog.

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS: Announcements for the winning manuscript and finalists will be made in October 2016.

 

SUBMIT HERE.

 

DESIGN: The winner's chapbook cover is made by the hands of BOAAT. We hand-make paper using a blender, cotton linters, construction paper, shredded money & rope, banana peels, seaweed, wildflowers, & (sometimes) seashells. Our book designs have been recognized as some of the most unique works of art from a small press.

Call for Submissions: Ploughshares

Our regular reading period is now open! We’re accepting submissions for Ploughshares literary magazine and for our Ploughshares Solos series of long stories and essays. The reading period will remain open until January 15, 2017. For guidelines and to access our submission manager, visit our website.

2015 marked the launch of our brand-new submission manager, just six short months after the launch of our brand-new website. We're happy to report that we've incorporated the great feedback we received over the past year into the system, making the submission process as streamlined as possible.

Remember, if you have a subscription to Ploughshares, you can submit online free of charge. Go here to subscribe.

Have something ready now? Submit today!

Writing Competition: The Cincinnati Review

The Cincinnati Review is now accepting entries for the 2016 Robert and Adele Schiff Awards in Poetry and Prose. One poem and one prose piece (fiction or creative nonfiction) will be chosen for publication in our 2017 prize issue, and the two winners will each receive $1,000.

The entry fee of $20 includes a year-long subscription, and submissions will be accepted from June 1st to July 15th. All entries will be considered for publication.

Please submit up to 8 pages of poetry or one story/essay of up to 40 pages per entry.

All entries should be submitted through our online submission manager. For complete contest guidelines, please visit our website.

Flash Fiction Competition: Gemini Magazine

The deadline for Gemini Magazine’s Eighth Annual Flash Fiction Contest is August 31.

The grand prize is $1,000. Second place wins $100 and four honorable mentions each win $25. All six finalists will be published online in the October 2016 issue of Gemini.

Send us a complete story in 1,000 words or less. Aside from the word limit, there are no rules in this contest. We are open to any style, subject or genre.

Writers' names are removed from entries before reading, so each entry gets an equal chance. Both new and established writers have won our fiction contests.

Entry fee: $5 ($4 for each additional entry). Full details here.

To get an idea of what we like, check out any of the dozens of previous winners/finalists from our Flash Fiction and Short Story Contests at the above link.

Call for Submissions: Star 82 Review Fall Issue

Star 82 Review is in its fourth year featuring humanity, humility, and humor. We tend toward subtle, slightly gentle, slightly edgy works. Looking for flash stories, poetry, and creative nonfiction under 1000 words, poetry 2-50 lines, and photos or images you’ve created that tell a story. Combinations of art and writing (erasure texts, microfiction with photo, comics, etc.) are highly desired.

Currently seeking work for our Fall issue, 4.3. The theme is coalescing around people who are there in plain sight, yet are plainly overlooked. They may be homeless. They may be in service jobs. They may be outside of your play group. Stay clean, stay empathetic, stay meaningful, stay hopeful, or quietly humorous.

Deadline: August 1 for Fall. Submissions accepted year-round.

See the guidelines here.

Like us on Facebook.
Read the magazine (new summer issue just released!).

Alisa Golden
Editor, Star 82 Review

Call for Submissions: Blue Heron Book Works

Blue Heron Book Works, LLC is seeking full length manuscripts--memoirs or fiction--with non-traditional points of view.

Please query us at:

infoATblueheronbookworksDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

Thank you.

Call for Poetry and Fiction Submissions: Liminal Stories

Liminal Stories is seeking poetry and fiction. Payment is 6 cents per word for fiction and $50 / poem for poetry. 

Guidelines here.

Reading period is June 1 through June 30.

Writing Competition for Short Story Collections: Yellow Flag Press

Deadline: August 1

 

Award: Publication

 

Fee: $10 

 

Yellow Flag Press publishes one collection of short fiction per year (beginning in 2017) under the banner of The Cypress & Pine Fiction Series. 

 

Collections of original stories by both established and emerging authors writing in English will be considered. Collections should be comprised of original stories and/or novellas that have not been published as a complete collection (stories published individually in journals or chapbook are fine). No novels at this time.

• Manuscripts should be between 100 and 200 pages.

• Number each page of the manuscript. Author’s last name and the collection title should appear at the top of each page.

• Include a table of contents and a page of acknowledgements if any of the stories have been previously published.

• All submissions must be through Submittable. We do not accept hard copies.

• Include a short biographical statement in the cover letter field in Submittable. We do not need a synopsis of the collection.

• Simultaneous submissions are accepted and encouraged. Please notify us immediately if your manuscript is accepted for publication elsewhere or if you wish to withdraw it for any reason.

Please send only one manuscript a year. Each submission will receive a copy of the collection selected as the first in The Cypress & Pine Fiction Series. Copies will be mailed when the book is published in the spring of 2017. For this reason be sure that your mailing address is up to date with Submittable, and please notify us if you move before books are mailed.

Seeking MFA Mentors/Faculty: Carlow University Low-Residency MFA Program

The MFA Program in Creative Writing welcomes the submission of resumes by creative writing faculty in fiction, poetry, & creative nonfiction. Over the next few years we anticipate the possibility of hiring additional visiting faculty to teach in the Carlow University low-residency MFA program.

 

Minimum requirements include book publication in fiction, poetry, or creative nonfiction, a graduate degree, and experience teaching creative writing at the college and/or graduate levels. We also look for experience teaching in intensive residencies and in online discussion forums, and evident commitment to cultural diversity and educational equity. 

 

Send cv & cover letter to Kevin Haworth, Director, MFA in Creative Writing, Carlow University at:

 

khaworthATcarlowDOTedu (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

 

Thanks!
Kevin Haworth
Director, Program in Creative Writing
Carlow University

Call for Submissions from Undergrads: Sink Hollow

Sink Hollow, the national undergraduate literary journal at Utah State University, is seeking provocative, resonant, polished pieces of undergraduate work for its debut issue to be published in spring 2016. We accept all original fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and art. All students currently enrolled as undergraduates at two- and four-year colleges and universities are invited to submit!

 

Deadline: October 3, 2016 

 

Please visit us at our website and submit your work here.

Call for Anthology Submissions on the Theme of "The Best of MFAs, 2016": Blue Heron Book Works

Blue Heron Book Works, LLC is seeking submissions for an anthology, THE BEST OF MFAs, 2016. 2016 graduates of any MFA program are invited to submit a short piece (no longer than 3,500 words) for inclusion in our anthology showcasing the best work of recent MFA graduates.

All genres considered, just send us your best work.

Deadline is July 1.

We plan to publish in late 2016. Send a cover letter telling us about yourself, the MFA program you graduated from, and attach your work. Please adhere to traditional formatting guidelines.

Send to:

infoATblueheronbookworksDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

Thank you.

Call for Submissions on the Theme of "Off the Record": The Chattachochee Review

Deadline: September 15, 2016

Call for Submissions: Off the Record. Disappearing remarks. Invisible people. Music that isn’t there. Intuition. Gut. Unclaimed, unofficial, uncategorized. A record respects the broadest possible audience. Off the record, your audience awaits. What you don’t want to write. We want to read. Note the call in a cover letter.

Deadline September 15 or until the issue fills. 

See our website for more details. 

Call for Flash Fiction: Brilliant Flash Fiction

Deadline: Rolling

Submissions wanted: 1,000 words or less. We are looking for short works that give the reader a "flash" of revelation or surprise; or beautifully written (or humorous) short, short stories that burn into the reader's memory... and, check out our no-fee writing contests. No poetry, please.

For more information, please visit our website.

Call for Creative Nonfiction: bioStories

Deadline: Rolling

bioStories is an online literary magazine of creative nonfiction focused on biography and autobiography. We publish weekly “feature essays”, semi-annual digital issues, and digital and print thematic anthologies. We read submissions year round for essays keeping with our tradition of “sharing the extraordinary in ordinary lives,” and run two annual thematic contests.

Writers are encouraged to visit the website to gain a full sense of our reading tastes and literary mission of presenting exceptional writers exploring the subtleties of the lives we might otherwise overlook. Full submission guidelines are available by visiting our website.

Call for Submissions by Women: Dying Dahlia Review

Deadline: September 1, 2016

Dying Dahlia Review is seeking poetry, flash fiction, and cover art by women writers and artists for our first ever eBook issue. The issue will be released at the end of the year. For an idea of what we are looking for, visit our site and check out the archives.

Please send up to 5 poems (each no longer than a page), 3 flash fiction pieces (no longer than a 1000 words each) or 3 images (no bigger than 5 MB each).  

Submissions for the eBook issue must be received by September 1st. 

For complete guidelines, please visit our website.

Call for Poetry Submissions: Soul-Lit

Soul-Lit, an on-line journal of spiritual poetry, is accepting submissions for its summer edition.

In keeping with the one-year anniversary of the SCOTUS decision on marriage equality, the issue will be LGBTQ themed. Everyone is invited to submit spiritual poetry on this theme.

Complete guidelines at our website.

Call for Poetry Submissions Inspired by the Music and Spirit of Prince: Delaware Poetry Review

Call for poems for a special issue of the Delaware Poetry Review, “This Thing Called Life”: Poetry Inspired by the Music and Spirit of Prince

Prince Rogers Nelson was a prolific and experimental studio musician and a dynamic, improvisational live performer whose career spanned nearly forty years (1978-2016). During that period, he mastered multiple instruments, explored various genres of music (from Jazz to Rock and Roll), created his own unique “Minneapolis Sound,” fought for the publishing rights of artists and attracted a diverse and passionate fanbase. In addition, his seemingly endless fount of creativity and disciplined work ethic (he released no fewer than 39 albums) inspired artists of all walks of life, including those of us who express ourselves in lines and stanzas.

Delaware Poetry Review invites writers to submit previously unpublished poems inspired by some aspect of Prince’s music, genius and eclectic creative spirit. Writers are also encouraged to interpret this theme on a broader level and address how other factors relate to Prince, including but not limited to, the music industry, concert culture, Paisley Park, media (mass and social), fellow artists, etc.

Submission Guidelines: Authors may send up to 5 previously unpublished poems to Delaware Poetry Review at:

depoetry5ATgmailDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

no later than midnight (EST) July 15, 2016. 

• All poems must have the author’s full contact information on each poem. 

• Poems must be sent in a single Word or Text file, as an attachment. 

• The email subject line should give the poet’s last name and number of poems (Smith 4 poems, for example), and the email must include a one-paragraph bio of up to 150 words. 

• Incomplete submissions, or those received after the deadline, cannot be considered.

Call for Papers and Presentations: John R. Milton Writers' Conference

CALLS FOR PAPERS AND CREATIVE PRESENTATIONS
JOHN R. MILTON WRITERS' CONFERENCE:
POSSIBLE IMPOSSIBILITIES / IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBILITIES:
GEOGRAPHIC, AESTHETIC, GENDERED, RACIAL, AND HISTORICAL FRONTIERS
OCTOBER 27-29, 2016
THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH DAKOTA, VERMILLION, SOUTH DAKOTA

CFP: Possible Impossibilities / Impossible Possibilities: Geographic, Aesthetic, Gendered, Racial, and Historical Frontiers (7/15/16; The University of South Dakota, Vermillion, South Dakota, October 27-29, 2016)

Please join us for the biennial John R. Milton Writers' Conference, held October 27-29, 2016, at The University of South Dakota in Vermillion, South Dakota.
This year’s conference theme is Possible Impossibilities / Impossible Possibilities: Geographic, Aesthetic, Gendered, Racial, and Historical Frontiers. In addition to presentations of writers reading their creative work, we are seeking panel proposals, roundtable proposals, scholarly papers, and criti-creative presentations related (either explicitly or implicitly) to the theme of Possible Impossibilities / Impossible Possibilities: Geographic, Aesthetic, Gendered, Racial, and Historical Frontiers. Possible topics or approaches might include, but are in no way limited to, Possible Impossibilities / Impossible Possibilities: Geographic, Aesthetic, Gendered, Racial, and Historical Frontiers with respect to:

• Western American literature, history, and culture;

• post-colonial and/or indigenous studies in American Indian literature, history, and culture;

• aesthetic frontiers and innovative literature(s);

• environmental issues and ecocriticism;

• the American West as myth and fantasy space;

• discourses of difference/otherness, including multiculturalism, race, ethnicity, and ability; gender, and/or queerness; 
• Manifest Destiny;the role of virtual culture, cyberspace as “new frontier,” and simulacra; and

• popular culture (including, but not limited to film, television, graphic novels, and science fiction).

For critical work, please submit a 250-word abstract, along with a brief biographical note, by July 15, 2016. Panel proposals should include individual paper abstracts and biographical notes for all of the participating panelists, in addition to a 250-word justification for the panel. Roundtable proposals should include a 250-word justification for the roundtable session, along with biographical notes for the participating round table session members.

For creative submissions, please submit 5-8 sample pages of poetry, or no more than 10 sample pages of creative prose writing, along with a short biographical note, by July 15, 2016. While creative work that either explicitly or implicitly addresses the conference theme, or is related in some way to region or landscape are always welcome, all types of creative work on any theme and in any style will be gladly considered for readings at the conference's creative writing panels.

All submissions should be sent to Lee Ann Roripaugh at: 

Lee.RoripaughATusdDOTedu (Change AT to @ and DOT to . ) 

Lee Ann Roripaugh
Professor of English
Director of Creative Writing
Editor-in-Chief, South Dakota Review
The University of South Dakota
414 E. Clark Street
Vermillion, SD 57069

Call for Nonfiction and Art Submissions: The Drowning Gull

The Drowning Gull is a literary platform dedicated to publishing what other popular literary magazines often won’t… including book reviews, novel excerpts, comic strips, and pretty much anything else out of the ordinary that you can think of. Maybe you have some fiction or narrative nonfiction that in some way strays from the norm, and you are struggling to place it.

Having just released their first issue , The Drowning Gull staff are more determined than ever to bring you the best in nonfiction and artwork in their second issue.

ISSUE #2 THEME: ENCOUNTERS WITH NATURE
READING FROM MAY 1- DECEMBER 1

Maybe you are the victim of a snake bite. Maybe a wild animal randomly walked up to you for a pat. Perhaps you’re a researcher who works with animals.

The issue will be NONFICTION AND ART ONLY. We want to read funny and awkward true stories. The first issue of The Drowning Gull features only a few pieces of nonfiction, so we need anyone reading this to spread the word!

Visit this page for more details on how to submit.

Call for Poetry Submissions: The Skinny Poetry Journal

The Skinny Poetry Journal (TSPJ) seeks new poetry. TSPJ is a literary journal that is dedicated to The Skinny poetry form. A Skinny is a short poem form, created by Truth Thomas, that consists of eleven lines. The first and eleventh lines can be any length (although shorter lines are favored). The eleventh and last line must be repeated using the same words from the first and opening line (however, those words can be rearranged). The second, sixth, and tenth lines must be identical.

The point of The Skinny, or Skinnys, is to convey a vivid image with as few words as possible. Skinny poems can be about any subject. They can also be linked, like Haiku, Senryu or Tanka.

To submit your Skinnys for publishing consideration, email:  

theskinnypoetryjournalATgmailDOTcom (Change AT to @ and DOT to . )

with your poem, or poems, copied into the body of your email.

To see examples of this new poetry form, go to our website.

Call for Submissions: Lime Hawk

Lime Hawk, a quarterly online journal of culture, environment, and sustainability, is seeking new prose (fiction / nonfiction) and visual art for its Spring Issue [9].

Past issues addressed themes ranging from body identity to technology and alienation, mental illness, animal welfare, nostalgia, passion, and purpose.

Check out previous issues at our website, then send us your fresh new work!

No deadline to submit. No reading fees.

Submittable link!

Call for Submissions: The Good Men Project

The Good Men Project gets over 2.5 million visitors each month from every country in the world, has 500 million total pageviews since we launched 5 years ago, and and has published over 40,000 stories and articles about men, manhood, masculinity. Through first-person narratives of and about men, as well as issue-based posts designed to provoke, engage and provide insights, we have become a thought-leader on the issues of manhood and masculinity in these changing times. Some of our hottest topics include: First person narratives, Dads, Sports, Ethics, Sex & Relationships (and Marriage & Commitment), Health & Wellness, the Environment, Social Justice, Business and Politics.
 
We think you will enjoy contributing to a mission-based publication that has vast reach and high engagement with its community of readers and writers.
 
We are looking for original nonfiction, personal narratives, poetry, blog posts, interviews, previously published blog posts (that you have the rights to), previously published online articles or essays (that you have rights to), book reviews, and book excerpts. We do not publish fiction. Only on-brand submissions will be considered. A piece must always must be about, by, or focused on men and the changing roles in society---even if (or especially if) the contributor is a woman.
 
We read submissions on all topics on a rolling basis. For May 2016, we are also looking for pieces on Asian American Pacific Islander month and Mental Health Awareness Month. For June 2016 we have a big push for Father’s day.

Simultaneous submissions are welcome as long as you let us know as soon as a piece has been accepted elsewhere.

To review our complete submissions guidelines or send us your work, please visit our Submittable portal.

We look forward to hearing from you.