We found nearly four dozen excellent free poetry and prose contests with deadlines between October 15-November 30. In this issue, we bring you Julian Peters' illustration of "The God Abandons Antony" by Constantine P. Cavafy. Annie Mydla explores the art of subtext—hints that build your story without being explicit.
This month's tip comes from subscriber Mishti Krishna, advocating for scribbling out first drafts the old-fashioned way. If you have a tip, recommendation, or warning, please email it to info@winningwriters.com.
 CONGRATULATIONS to the winners of our 33rd annual Tom Howard/John H. Reid Fiction & Essay Contest! Bea Chang submitted the winning essay, "Requiem for a Bubble Tea". Shelby Stewart submitted the winning story, "Going and Going and Going". The winners each received $3,500 and a gift certificate from Duotrope, and we commissioned original art for both entries. We also awarded 12 Honorable Mentions (yes, two extra) and $500 to Paul Curley, Joan Dempsey, Lucinda Dhavan, Aria Dominguez, Martha Grace Duncan, Katherine Dykstra, Doug Emory, Robin Hirsch, Steven R. Perez, R.L. "Pete" Peterson, Patricia Schultheis, and Christy Tending.
This contest received 1,757 entries from around the world. Mina Manchester judged, with assistance from Sarah Halper. We would also like to recognize the exceptional contest administration and service provided by Annie Mydla, Paweł Zagawa, and Ewa Stachyra. Read the press release. Read the winning entries with the judge's remarks.
Our new Fiction & Essay contest is open now. We will again award two $3,500 prizes and at least ten $500 Honorable Mentions. Duotrope rejoins us as a co-sponsor. The contest deadline is May 1, 2026. We extend deep gratitude to Mina Manchester for her tenure as contest judge. For 2026, she is passing the baton to our new final judge, Tamra Badgett. Sarah Halper returns as our screening assistant.
View past newsletters in our archives. Need assistance? Let us help. Join our 62,000 followers on Facebook and Bluesky. Advertise with us, starting at $20.
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Congratulations to Remi Recchia, Koss, Rob Rogers, Shanna McNair, Julia LaFond, Dr. Bob Rich, Yvonne Fein, Stephanie Stockmeister, and Terri Kirby Erickson.
Judy Juanita will speak at Laney College T450 in Oakland, CA, and on Zoom, at noon-1pm Pacific time on October 16. The topic is "Abortion: Rarely an Easy Decision". Judy says, "My book, Abortion (or Woman as Threefold Murderess), forthcoming in December, begins with a lengthy personal essay about my abortion when I was a college student and recipient of the California Therapeutic Abortion Act in June 1967. The book examines the sensitive and historically long-standing expectations and pressures on women facing unwanted pregnancy."
Červená Barva Press is offering an online literary summit during October 17-19. Twelve events will be broadcast on YouTube. Attendees will have two weeks to watch the videos. Learn more and register now for $82.
Rob Mermin, author of Circle of Sawdust, will give a book reading and discussion at the Vermont Circus Festival in Brattleboro, November 5, 6-7:30pm, at the Brooks Memorial library. Rob was the Creative Nonfiction & Memoir winner in our 2024 North Street competition.
Learn about our subscribers' achievements and see links to samples of their work.
Have news? Please email it to jendi@winningwriters.com.
Do you use TikTok or Instagram? Send your news to the @winningwriters account so we can share it!
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At Gatekeeper Press, publishing is a true partnership. We empower indie authors with full creative freedom, professional quality, and support at every step.
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Your story deserves the spotlight.
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Deadline: October 15, 2025, 11:59pm PDT
The scariest monsters aren't hiding under the bed. They're the ones we made ourselves. Write about the monsters of our own making and how they haunt us today, whether that's AI and tech, structural violence, climate collapse, or something just as insidious.
We are not looking for ghost stories or urban legends. Instead, send us writing that responds to what you doomscroll through. We're seeking recipes for social justice, prose that explores the perils of smartphone addiction, poems about inflammatory rhetoric and the platforms they build, survival tips for the singularity, and more. Show us what "monsters of our own making" means to you.
We welcome all forms: fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, hybrid, or something even genre goblins can't categorize. Please submit up to 1,000 words of prose and up to two pages of poetry. Unpublished work only, please. If it's urgent, sharp, and dripping with weird, we want to read it.
Send us your words that are as alive and unruly as the moment. Three winners will be selected and published at the end of November. Prizes: $1,000, $200, and $100. Entry fee: $10.
Submit online via Duosuma.
About Glossy Planet
From the folks who publish The Masters Review, Glossy Planet is a new lit mag that responds to the world in real time. Every month, we drop a new challenge tied to what's happening in the headlines, the culture, and the moment. Think: the literary version of a group chat, if your group chat included a bunch of writers trying to make sense of it all.
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Deadline extended to October 18, 2025, 11:59 PDT
$5,000 Fiction | $5,000 Nonfiction | $5,000 Poetry
Winners receive a cash prize, publication in the Spring 2026 issue of the Missouri Review, and promotion across our social media channels.
Guidelines
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Submit one piece of fiction or nonfiction up to 8,500 words or any number of poems between 6 to 12 pages. Please double-space fiction and nonfiction entries.
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Multiple submissions and simultaneous submissions are welcome, but you must pay a separate fee for each entry and withdraw the piece immediately if accepted elsewhere.
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Entries must be previously unpublished.
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Standard Entry fee: $25. Each entrant receives a one-year subscription to the Missouri Review in digital format (normal price $24) and a digital copy of the latest title in our imprint, Missouri Review Books, a short story anthology by former contributors (normal price $7.95).
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"All Access" Entry fee: $30. In addition to the one-year digital subscription to the Missouri Review and TMR Books e-book, Life Support: Stories of Health & Medicine, entry fee grants access to the last 10 years of digital issues and the audio recordings of each digital issue.
Submit online or by mail.
Read prizewinning stories by Melissa Yancy, Rachel Yoder, and Thomas Dodson, essays by Peter Selgin and Dave Zoby, and a selection from poetry winners Katie Bickham, Kai Carlson-Wee, and Alexandra Teague. You can also check out readings and conversations with past winners on our YouTube
channel.
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The Next Generation Short Story Awards is a not-for-profit awards program open to authors writing original unpublished short stories in English.
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Submissions accepted: Short stories and poems (5,000 words or fewer)
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Categories: 30+
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Deadline: Thursday, February 26, 2026
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Prizes for Winners: Winners in each category are given $75 cash prizes, gold medals, digital promotional stickers, social media coverage, literary exposure, story publication in an Anthology of Winners, and a complimentary copy of the Anthology of Winners. Three Grand Prize Winners selected from all entries are awarded $500, $300, and $200 based on the rank of their story and are invited to attend the Indie Book Awards gala ceremony.
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Enter at: www.shortstoryawards.com
Next Generation is offering an Early Bird Special discount for the month of October to all writers. Enter and pay by October 31, 2025, to receive your second category (for the same story) for free!
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You've got the characters. You've got the setting. You've got the plot. You've got the word count.
But where's your subtext?
Authors are often surprised when I bring up subtext in a critique or our book competition's free feedback. Their mind is still very much on what they've written, versus what they haven't written.
But it's what they haven't written—the subtext—that makes a book feel like a "real book".
Subtext is when a combination of ideas makes the reader draw a conclusion that's not stated by any of them.
Read on.
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Deadline: November 15, 2025
First Prize: $1,250, publication in LitMag, and agency review by Amy Bishop-Wycisk of Trellis Literary Management, Emily Wescott of CAA, Hailey Hedemann of William Morris Endeavor, Kelsey Day of Aragi, PJ Mark of Janklow & Nesbit, and Rayhane Sanders of Massie & McQuilken.
Finalists: Three finalists will receive $100 each. All finalists will be considered for possible agency review and publication.
Submit 1-3 unpublished poems with each entry fee of $18. Enter through Submittable only.
Click for the complete guidelines and enter your poems.
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Deadline: November 30, 2025
First Prize: $1,250, publication in LitMag, and agency review by Sarah Fuentes of UTA, Molly Glick of CAA, Erin Harris and Sonali Chanchani of Folio Literary Management, Jenny Bent of The Bent Agency, David Forrer of Inkwell Management, Monika Woods of Triangle House, Emily Forland of Brandt & Hochman, and Nat Sobel of Sobel Weber Associates.
Finalists: Three finalists will receive $100 each. All finalists will be considered for possible agency review and publication.
Entries must be unpublished short stories between 500 and 1,500 words. Enter through Submittable only. Entry fee: $16.
Click for the complete guidelines and enter your flash fiction.
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Deadline: December 31, 2025
Gifted fiction writers! Lilith magazine—independent, Jewish & frankly feminist—seeks quality short stories with heart, soul, and chutzpah, 3,000 words or under, double-spaced, for our Annual Fiction Contest.
First prize: $300 and publication. No fee to enter. We especially like fresh fiction with feminist and Jewish nuance and are eager to read submissions from writers of color and emerging writers of any age.
Submit to info@lilith.org with the subject line “Fiction Contest” and your surname. INCLUDE FULL CONTACT INFORMATION ON MANUSCRIPT.
Check out FRANKLY FEMINIST: Short Stories by Jewish Women from Lilith Magazine, available here or wherever you buy books.
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This Month's Tip
Getting Your First Draft Flowing
Subscriber Mishti Krishna urges writers to start off old school: "Writing the first draft of any piece of writing on a piece of paper is far more powerful than typing it on the screen, for it allows the ideas to flow freely. Typing the first draft cages all the potential, tangents, and creativity your ideas may bring with it."
Read the first and second chapters from Mishti's how NOT to murder your academic rival: ft. my favourite pen.
Have a tip, recommendation, or warning? Please email it to us at info@winningwriters.com.
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2024 North Street Book Prize: First Prize for Creative Nonfiction & Memoir
Rob Mermin's Circle of Sawdust is a personal story of the wild characters, remarkable histories, and behind-the-scenes world of traditional traveling circuses. It's the true-life tale of a boy's impulse to run off and join the circus and then—through doubt, failure, loss, and tragedy—pursue the implausible vision of starting his own circus.
"There is a magical quality in this book. Yes, it is a circus story, but it is really about the struggles of pursuing a dream, reaching it, and having the courage to push beyond it. It is highly entertaining, masterful storytelling! It reads like a Chaplin silent film, from laugh-out-loud comedy, to moving us to tears, completely capturing the essence of a life in circus."
—Alla Youdina, Creative Director, Moscow Circus and Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey
Kirkus Reviews, the nation's leading source of book reviews, gave the book a starred review, calling it "a fascinating tour de force that displays the enduring, unique appeal of the circus."
Mermin ran off to join the circus in 1969 and studied the art of mime with famed French mime Marcel Marceau. An accomplished performer, entrepreneur, author, lecturer, playwright, and director, Mermin founded the award-winning international touring company Circus Smirkus in Greensboro, Vermont.
Jendi Reiter, final judge of the North Street Book Prize, says, "Mermin's anecdotes from six decades in the circus are hilarious, poignant, and hair-raising. What makes this memoir resonate for me, however, is the model it provides for the artistic life, a deft balance of spontaneity and dedication that leaves no room for self-aggrandizement." Read the full North Street critique.
Read an excerpt from Circle of Sawdust (PDF)
Buy this book on Bookshop.org and Amazon.
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Deadline: Friday, January 2, 2026, 11:59pm Eastern US Time
Last time we checked, 77% of web-based fiction magazines pay their fiction writers nothing.
So did 60% of print-only fiction magazines!
If you'd like to try getting paid for your fiction, why not consider us? Since 2006, On The Premises magazine has aimed to promote newer and/or relatively unknown writers who can write creative, compelling stories told in effective, uncluttered, and evocative prose. We've never charged a reading fee or publication fee, and we pay between $75 and $250 for short stories that fit each issue's broad story premise. We publish stories in nearly every genre (literary/realist, mystery, light/dark fantasy, light/hard sci-fi, slipstream) aimed at readers older than 12 (no children's fiction).
The premise for our latest contest is "The Return of..."
For this contest, write a creative, compelling, well-crafted story between 1,000 and 5,000 words long in which someone or something has returned after a significant absence. Does this return make people happy, unhappy, or somewhere in-between? That's up to you. Also: Was this return a surprise, or was it expected? That's also up to you.
One entry per author. No fee for entering.
Any genre except children's fiction, exploitative sex, or over-the-top gross-out horror is fine. We will not accept parodies of another author's specific fictional characters or world(s), and we do not accept fan fiction for the same reason. We will accept serious literary drama, crazy farces, and any variation of science fiction and fantasy you can imagine. Read our past issues and see!
You can find details and instructions for submitting your story here. To be informed when new contests are launched, subscribe to our free, short, monthly newsletter by using the text box at the bottom of our home page.
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Deadline: January 5, 2026
The 2026 DISQUIET Prize is now open for submissions.
Entries are accepted in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. One winner in each category will be published in Granta.com (fiction), NinthLetter.com (non-fiction) or The Common (poetry).
One grand prize winner will receive a full scholarship, accommodations, and travel stipend to attend the fourteenth annual DISQUIET International Literary Program in Lisbon (June 28-July 10, 2026).
Genre winners will receive a tuition waiver for DISQUIET 2026 in addition to publication.
Winners who are unable to attend the program in Lisbon may elect to receive a $1,000 cash prize in lieu of the tuition waiver.
See the complete guidelines at DISQUIET International Literary Program.
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Entries must be received by January 30, 2026
Submissions are now being accepted for the 12th William Saroyan International Prize for Writing. Two prizes of $5,000 each are given for works of fiction and nonfiction. All entries must be predominantly in English and available for individual purchase by the general public. Self-published books are eligible. Poetry will not be considered in this cycle.
The awards, co-sponsored by Stanford University Libraries and the William Saroyan Foundation, commemorate the life, legacy and intentions of William Saroyan—author, artist, dramatist, composer—and are intended to encourage new or emerging writers, rather than to recognize established literary figures.
The award honors the Saroyan literary legacy. What is the Saroyan legacy or style?
Saroyan's literary style is characterized by originality, stylistic innovation and what is often described as an "exuberant humanism". It is this exuberance and desire to move art in new directions, rather than relevance to the particulars of Saroyan's common settings or themes, that Saroyan Prize judges will be seeking.
Submit five copies of your work published between January 1, 2024, and December 31, 2025, with a $50 entry fee by January 30, 2026. An electronic file of your book will be accepted only if the book is not available in hard copy form. Writers who have published up to two books are eligible. Visit the Saroyan Prize website for complete eligibility and submission details.
 Congratulations to Mirinae Lee and Fae Myenne Ng, winners of the 2024 Saroyan Prize. University Librarian Michael A. Keller announced awards of $5,000 to each winner and remarked, "Both of these outstanding books offer fascinating cultural insights at the person-to-person level
otherwise very difficult to perceive." Learn more about their achievement.
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Some contests are best suited to writers at the early stages of their careers. Others are better for writers with numerous prizes and publications to their credit. Here is this month's selection of Spotlight Contests for your consideration:
Emerging Writers
Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. Northwestern University's Poetry and Poetics Colloquium and Northwestern University Press will award $500 and chapbook publication for a poetry manuscript, 25-35 pages, by an emerging poet of color who is a US citizen and has not previously published a book-length volume of poetry. The goal is to celebrate and publish works of lasting cultural value and literary excellence by minority poets. Must be received by October 31 (new deadline).
Intermediate Writers
ALCS Tom-Gallon Trust Award. The Society of Authors will award a top prize of 2,000 pounds for a short story (5,000 words maximum) by a resident of the United Kingdom, Commonwealth, or the Republic of Ireland who has had at least one short story published or accepted for publication. Previously published work accepted. Must be received by October 31.
Advanced Writers
Stowe Prize for Literary Activism. The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center will award $10,000 to a US author whose prose work (fiction and nonfiction compete together) "illuminates a critical social justice issue in contemporary society in the United States." Nominated work must have been published in the US within the past 3 years. Authors may self-nominate. This prize was launched in 2011 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the antislavery classic Uncle Tom's Cabin. Must be received by November 1.
See more Spotlight Contests for emerging, intermediate, and advanced writers within The Best Free Literary Contests database.
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Winning Writers finds open submission calls and free contests in a variety of sources, including Erika Dreifus' Practicing Writer newsletter, FundsforWriters, Erica Verrillo's blog, Authors Publish, Lit Mag News Roundup, Poets & Writers, The Writer, Duotrope, and literary journals' own newsletters and announcements.
• Foglifter: "Body Politics" Issue
(writing, art, audio, video about the queer body in society - October 16)
• Ninth Letter: "Performance" Issue
(poetry, fiction, essays on performance of self - November 1)
• Notable Works: Environmental Poetry Anthology
(poems about collective action to protect the environment - November 1)
• Grayson Books: Connecticut Poetry Anthology
(poems about CT people, places, or historical events - December 1)
• Blanket Gravity Magazine
(fiction, essays, artwork that explores mental health or emotional life - January 10)
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Julian Peters' new book, Nature Poems to See By: A Comic Artist Interprets More Great Poems, is coming this spring. Pre-order it now at Amazon.
The God Abandons Antony
by Constantine P. Cavafy
When suddenly, at midnight, you hear
an invisible procession going by
with exquisite music, voices,
don't mourn your luck that's failing now,
work gone wrong, your plans
all proving deceptive—don't mourn them uselessly.
[poem continues]
Translated from the Greek by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard
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October Links Roundup: Act Like It Matters
In this time of great disruption and uncertainty, one can find relief in the spiritual principle of non-attachment to results, as propounded by Thomas Merton and the Talmud's Rabbi Tarfon, who said that "it is not incumbent upon you to finish the work, but neither are you free to desist from it." On the other hand, a too-glib reliance on such reassurance can make us satisfied with merely performative activism. [read more]
Jendi Reiter is the editor of Winning Writers. Visit their website.
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