carte blanche, accepts poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Send us your odes, sonnets, free verse, short stories of all types and genres, memoirs, personal essays, book reviews, literary journalism, musings on the writing process—as long as it’s well written (and within our 3500 word limit) we’ll consider it.

They also have an annual prize for an outstanding submission by a Quebec writer.

I really should have posted this sooner.

Enjoy!

TDR publishes four new short stories every three months (i.e., in September, December, March and June). There is no minimum or maximum length requirement.

Submissions for each issue will be received in the month prior to publication. For example, if you want your story to be considered for the September issue, send it to us in August.
Please: only one story per writer per submission period.

They pay $100 for short fiction and submissions are electronic, which is convenient. They also have a good guide for students (read: new writers) and a massive list of helpful links.

The 500 were evaluated by Publishers Weekly editors, and Penguin’s editors used those evaluations to pick a group of 100 semi-finalists, which were voted on by the hoi polloi to choose three finalists. A panel of guest editors picked the winner, the mystery novel Fresh Kills, by Bill Loehfelm. Last year TWS alumna Gurjinder Basran made it to the semi-finals.

Amazon just announced that they’re doing it again. The prize is a publishing contract with Penguin and a $25,000 advance. The submission deadline in February 2009. Here’s what you need to enter:

Entrants must provide a full Manuscript (Between 50,000 and 150,000 words), an Excerpt from the beginning of your novel (Between 3,000 and 5,000 words), a novel Pitch of up to 300 words and accompanying contest and biographic information such as title, genre, book description, and contact information. (as well as an optional author photo).

So polish that novel that’s been wedged between Fallout 3 and that folder of Facebook messages to your ex- that you write but never send because she won’t accept your friend requests.

And then check out how to enter for more information. Be warned that submissions are rolling and they only accept the first 10,000, so the earlier the better.

The Editors’ Prize Contest is now accepting entries, with $1,000 awarded in each genre. The entry fee is $16, which includes a reading of your work, a subscription to Meridian, and a chance at the $1,000 prize.

Poets can upload four poems per entry. Fiction writers may submit one story of 10,000 words or fewer per entry.

And…

We’re also excited to announce our second Prose Poem Postcard Prize Contest. Entry fee: $3.50. Entries should be 1-2 prose poems, each of which must be able to fit onto a standard-size postcard.

The prize for the second contest is publication. Submission is electronic and the eligibility requirements are either that you’re an alumni of U of VA, or a subscriber to the magazine (US$16). Gory details here.

• Any unpublished work in either category
• Two categories: poetry (500 words) or fiction (1500 words)
• Deadline: Oct 26th, 5pm
• Entry fee $10 CAD
• Prizes: 1st $350 & publication in subTERRAIN magazine, 2nd $250, both published on VIWF website

Rock!

Halloween is just around the corner, so you should know what that means–the annual Apex Halloween short fiction contest!

Guidelines:
Your story must incorporate the theme of ELECTION HORROR.
Word count maximum is 1,000.
Your story must have first rights available.
Submit your story to halloween@apexdigest.com.
Submissions are open NOW.
Deadline is 11:59 PM, October 15th, EST.

This year’s celebrity judge is noted SF author Jay Lake!

First prize is $100 & publication. Second prize is $50 & publication. Third and fourth prizes are free books. Not too shabby!

(Thx, Merry Old Soul)

The Federation of BC Writers is having a competition for short fiction: Literary Writes 2008. Deadline is right around the corner, July 1, 2008, and the entry fee is $20 ($15 if you’re a member). Any genre is acceptable, and prizes are $500, $300, $150, plus publication in WordWorks and an opportunity to read at Word on the Street, Vancouver’s annual downtown literary fest.

Good luck, and let me know if you enter.

While definitive figures on sales generated by self-published books are hard to come by, there are estimates that they could be well into the billions of dollars. A report, Under the Radar by the Book Industry Study Group estimated that non-calculated sales by smaller publishers and self-publish companies could be as high as $14.2bn (£7.3bn) in 2005, the last year statistics were available.

A quick look at Lulu’s list of best-selling fiction has an author who turned his self-published novel into a book deal with St Martin’s. Admittedly, he writes somewhat Christian fiction, which is a market that’s been under served by traditional publishing houses, but even so it’s encouraging.

Another interesting site mentioned in the article is Wowio.com, an online store that sells nothing but ebooks.

So go read that. When you’re done, there ought to be some more posts here.