Ten Questions for Isaac Fitzgerald
“A reader who truly needs these stories might not come to them for weeks, months, or even years.” —Isaac Fitzgerald, author of Dirtbag, Massachusetts: A Confessional
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Genre: Creative Nonfiction
Layers of History
In her lyric essay “Tsunami” published in the Margins, Juliet S. Kono uses the zuihitsu form to tell a layered story about how her family has survived through multiple tsunami attacks. The essay uses dates to introduce each section, beginning with her family emigrating from Japan to Hawai’i in the early 1900s, then jumping to the devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Tōhoku, Japan, and culminating in 1946 when she and her family survived a deadly tsunami in Hilo, Hawai’i. Inspired by Kono, write a lyric essay that explores a shared history between you and your ancestors. Try using dates to structure the essay, adding historical and emotional layers to the narrative as you write.
Upcoming Contest Deadlines
With July already underway, it’s never too soon to start submitting to contests with a deadline of July 31! These competitions offer unique awards such as two cases of Dogfish Head craft beer, a weeklong residency at the Anam Cara Writer’s Retreat in West Cork, Ireland, and 20 copies of a letterpress broadside of a winning poem, alongside cash prizes of at least $500. One contest even has no entry fee. Cheers, writers!
Connecticut Poetry Society Experimental Poetry Contest: A prize of $1,000 and publication in Connecticut River Review will be given annually for an innovative poem. Richard Deming will judge. Audio and video recordings are eligible. Entry fee: $15.
Dogfish Head Craft Brewed Ales Dogfish Head Poetry Prize: A prize of $500, publication by Broadkill River Press, 10 author copies, and two cases of Dogfish Head craft beer are given annually for a poetry collection written by a poet living in Delaware, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington, D.C., or West Virginia. The winner is expected to attend a reading and award ceremony at the Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton, Delaware, on December 10. Lodging for a two-night stay at the Dogfish Inn in the beach town of Lewes, Delaware, is provided. Travel expenses are not included. Michael Glaser will judge. Entry fee: none.
Hidden River Arts Hawk Mountain Short Story Collection Award: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Hidden River Press is given annually for a story collection. Entry fee: $20.
Howling Bird Press Book Contest: A prize of $2,500 and publication by Howling Bird Press is given in alternating years for a book of poetry, fiction, or creative nonfiction. The 2023 prize will be awarded in nonfiction. Memoirs, essay collections, and other creative nonfiction are eligible. Entry fee: $25.
Munster Literature Centre Seán O’Faoláin International Short Story Competition: A prize of €2,000 (approximately $2,178) and publication in Southword is given annually for a short story. The winner also receives a weeklong residency at the Anam Cara Writer’s Retreat in West Cork and accommodation at the Cork International Short Story Festival. Entry fee: €19 (approximately $21).
Narrative Spring Story Contest: A prize of $2,500 and publication in Narrative is given annually for a short story, a short short story, an essay, or an excerpt from a work of fiction or creative nonfiction. A second-place prize of $1,000 is also awarded. The editors will judge. All entries are considered for publication. Entry fee: $27.
New Millennium Writings Awards: Four prizes of $1,000 each and publication in New Millennium Writings and on the journal’s website are given twice yearly for a poem, a short story, a short short story, and an essay that have not appeared in a print publication with a circulation over 5,000. All entries are considered for publication. Entry fee: $20.
Press 53 Award for Poetry: A prize of $1,000, publication by Press 53, and 50 author copies is given annually for a poetry collection. Tom Lombardo will judge. Entry fee: $30.
Red Wheelbarrow Poetry Prize: A prize of $1,000 and publication in Red Wheelbarrow is given annually for a single poem. The winner will also receive 20 copies of a letterpress broadside of the winning poem, printed by Gary Young at Greenhouse Review Press. Juan Felipe Herrera will judge. All entries are considered for publication. Entry fee: $15.
Sewanee Review Fiction, Poetry, and Nonfiction Contest: Three prizes of $1,000 each and publication in Sewanee Review are given annually for a group of poems, a short story, and an essay. Richie Hofmann will judge in poetry, Raven Leilani will judge in fiction, and Lisa Taddeo will judge in nonfiction. Entry fee: $30 (which includes a subscription to Sewanee Review).
Visit the contest websites for complete guidelines, and check out the Grants & Awards database and Submission Calendar for more contests in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.
Geoff Dyer on the Writing Life
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“One of the necessary disciplines in my life has been to discipline myself not to fall into despair when I’m not writing,” says Geoff Dyer in this Louisiana Channel interview in which he discusses his writing process and how his new book, The Last Days of Roger Federer: And Other Endings (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2022), came to be.
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Rosemary Donahue and Nichole Perkins: Sex and the Single Woman
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In this Books Are Magic event moderated by Denne Michele Norris, Rosemary Donahue reads from their essay “Thank U, Ex” and Nichole Perkins reads from her essay “Confessions of a Lonely Feminist” both published in the anthology Sex and the Single Woman: 24 Writers Reimagine Helen Gurley Brown’s Cult Classic (Harper Perennial, 2022) edited by Eliza Smith and Haley Swanson.
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Who I Am
“My multiethnic existence is a protest against a racial hierarchy,” says Kali Fajardo-Anstine in “Keeping the Stories,” a profile by Rigoberto González published in the July/August 2022 issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. “If you ask me about my identity, prepare to hear about a complicated ancestry. I am a Chicana of Indigenous and mixed ancestry, and the story of who I am is inextricably tied to this country.” Inspired by Fajardo-Anstine’s statement, write an essay about the experiences that influence how you identify yourself in the world. What are the many stories that make up who you are?
Submissions Open for Santa Fe Writers Project Book Award
The 2022 Santa Fe Writers Project (SFWP) Book Award is still open for submissions! Offered biennially for a book of fiction or creative nonfiction, the prize awards $1,500 and publication by the Santa Fe Writers Project, a publisher with global distribution. Writers from all around the world are welcome to apply, though submitted manuscripts must be written in English. Unpublished and self-published work as well as prose published with a micro or small press that has not received marketing support are eligible. Winners will receive a full developmental edit, collaboration with an in-house copy editor, and the opportunity to work closely with SFWP’s layout and design team.
Using only the online submission system, submit a story collection, a novel, an essay collection, or a memoir of any length with a $30 entry fee by July 18. Deesha Philyaw, author of the award-winning short story collection The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, will judge. Visit the website for complete guidelines.
An independent press founded in 1998, Santa Fe Writers Project challenges “the norms by embracing short stories, novellas, translations, reprints, and the avant-garde.” Started two years after the press began, the SFWP Book Award has previously been judged by writers including Carmen Maria Machado, Emily St. John Mandel, and Benjamin Percy. Recent contest winners are A.A. Balaskovits (Magic for Unlucky Girls), Lilly Dancyger (Negative Space), Wendy J. Fox (If the Ice Had Held), and Joseph Holt (Golden Heart Parade).
Feeling Musical
In the introduction to the anthology This Woman’s Work: Essays on Music (Hachette, 2022) edited by Kim Gordon and Sinéad Gleeson, which is featured in “The Anthologist” in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, composer and guitarist Heather Leigh writes about how the authors of each essay acknowledge that “music somehow remains intangible” and how “we can try to explain and to rationalize it, but we’re seduced back by the song.” What music seduces and captures you? Using this question as a guide, write an essay that centers around the impact a certain song or musician has had on your life. Use tangible memories and details to add texture to the composition of your essay.
Bill Gates’s Summer Reading 2022
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In this video, Bill Gates recommends five books for his annual summer reading list, which include the historical novel The Lincoln Highway (Viking, 2021) by Amor Towles and the speculative novel The Power (Little, Brown, 2017) by Naomi Alderman.
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Lars Horn in Conversation With Carolina De Robertis
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“Fish have always swum me beyond my body, exploded me into some other mythic, imagined space.” Lars Horn talks about their love of research, writing about transmasculinity, and piecing together their first book, Voice of the Fish: A Lyric Essay, which won the 2020 Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize, in this City Lights Live virtual event with Carolina De Robertis. Horn’s book is featured in Page One in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
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