Writing Competition on Theme of "Animals": After Happy Hour

After Happy Hour: "ANIMALS"

For this year's contest, we want submitters to go wild--or domesticated, or sentient, or whatever other form of beastly you're feeling. In other words: we're seeking work from any and all genres that involves non-human living creatures in some way, shape, or form.

Submissions that fit the theme will include some kind of animal. Note that this doesn't need to be a real animal. It can be a cryptid like a chupacabra, a hybrid made via genetic engineering, a robot pet, or some new species that you've made up. It also counts if it's a human who becomes an animal--a Kafka-style transformation, for example, or a were-beast, Selkie, etc. The animal can be an image or metaphor, too, but we're looking for more than a passing mention of birds singing from the trees. The animal should be integral to the story in some way, be that as a character, a plot point, or a central theme.

The contest will be judged by the After Happy Hour editors. We read submissions anonymously, so please remove your name and other identifying information from your file before sending it. 

Deadline: Feb. 15, 2024

More specific details:

Poetry: Send up to 3 individual poems, no line or word limits.

Fiction: Send a single short story or up to 3 flash or micro pieces (fewer than 1,000 words each) in a single document. We have no upper word limits, and aren’t opposed to publishing stories upwards of 5,000 words that justify their real estate.

Creative non-fiction: Send a single short work or up to 3 flash or micro pieces (fewer than 1,000 words each) in a single document. We are specifically looking for creative non-fiction for this issue, not scholarly essays about literary genres or subgenres (though if you’re using the tropes of scholarly essays within the context of a narrative or lyric piece, that we do want to see).

Suites: Send up to 5 linked works that will be considered as a set. Individual works within a suite can be poems or flash or micro-length prose (under 1,000 words each).

Hybrid/Cross-Genre: Yes, please. Follow whichever of the above guidelines makes the most sense.

Can I include images?

This is a soft no. We can’t accept color images, photos, or full-spread comics and graphic narratives since it’s a print issue (we want to give money to authors, not spend it on fancy printing). If your work includes black-and-white sketches or other small visual aspects we can consider those, but in general we’re focusing on the words in this issue.

Prize Info:

The winners and honorable mentions for this contest will receive a percentage of the total entry fees paid (including purchases of After Happy Hour print issues):
Up to 3 “ranked winners” will split 30%.
Up to 3 honorable mentions will split 15%

How this will look in practice will depend on the work we receive. Possible scenarios:

Three 1st place winners, one each in fiction, poetry, and CNF, who each get 10%; three honorable mentions, one in each category, that get 5%

Two 1st place winners, one each in poetry and prose, who each get 15%; two honorable mentions, one in each category, that get 7.5%

Overall 1st (20%) and 2nd (10%) place, plus 1-3 overall honorable mentions.

A single Grand Prize winner who walks away with the whole 30%, plus 1-3 overall honorable mentions

All submitted works will also be considered for publication in the issue. If we publish your work and you don’t win a prize, you’ll get $10 (basically you’ll get your entry fee back).

What happens with the rest of the entry fees?

Submittable takes $1.49 for each entry, so roughly 15%. The remaining 40% will go to printing the issue, with a portion to be donated to our current donation partner, the Western PA Fund for Choice.

Why percents instead of a flat prize?

It gives the editors more flexibility to give the prize money to the most deserving entries. If the best works we receive all happen to be from the same genre, it doesn’t seem fair to kick one out in place of a piece we feel is weaker. This also makes it easier to give prizes to hybrid and cross-genre works that might not easily fit into a pre-defined category.

How much will I win, though?

Our first contest had 57 entries and winners received $103 ($56 for honorable mentions). The second contest had 95 entires and the winner got $320 ($160 for the honorable mention). If the trend continues we'll probably get around 100-150ish entries this year, but who knows! We’ll post periodic updates on the Submittable page as the reading period moves along. 

More information and submissions link here.