CONTEST GUIDELINES:
Dzanc Books solicits submissions through three annual contests:
- the Prize for Fiction, which recognizes novels that are daring, original, and innovative, and offers a $5,000 advance and publication;
- the Short Story Collection, which seeks well-crafted and powerful book-length collections and offers a $2,000 advance and publication;
- and a final contest which changes from year to year. This year, we will offer a Diverse Voices Prize, seeking book-length literary fiction and nonfiction from writers in minority, underrepresented, or marginalized communities. The Diverse Voices Prize offers a $2,000 advance and publication. This contest does not have a reading fee.
Our contests open April 13 and close September 30. The winner of each contest, along with a short list of finalists, will be announced in by the end of the year.
Please note: At this time, we are not seeking submissions of poetry or YA/children's fiction.
For any questions about the contests or our submissions policy, please email michelle@dzancbooks.org. We look forward to reading your work.
The Dzanc Books Prize for Fiction recognizes daring, original, and innovative novels. A $5,000 advance and publication by Dzanc Books will be awarded to the winner. Finalists will be compiled in-house and passed along for evaluation to this year’s judges: Anne Valente (Our Hearts Will Burn Us Down and By Light We Knew Our Names), Tina May Hall (The Snow Collectors and The Physics of Imaginary Objects), and Jessie van Eerden, author of Call It Horses, which was chosen as the winner of last year’s Prize for Fiction.
The contest is open to new, upcoming, and established writers alike. Agented submissions are also eligible, and we ask that you include all agency contact information with the application. All submitted works must be previously unpublished novel-length manuscripts and should include a brief synopsis, author bio, and contact information. The full work should be formatted as a Word .doc or .docx file.
We will accept submissions from April 13th, 2020 through midnight on September 30th, 2020. There is a $25 submission fee. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) The winning submission and a short list of finalists will be announced on the Dzanc web page by January 2021.
Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. All contest fees will go toward funding the prize as well as supporting Dzanc’s commitment to producing quality literary works, providing creative writing instruction in public schools through the Dzanc Writers-in-Residence program, and offering low-cost workshops for aspiring authors. Active and former Dzanc authors and employees are not eligible for the prize.
Established in 2020, the Dzanc Books Diverse Voices Prize seeks brilliant, daring, and imaginative book-length manuscripts of fiction or nonfiction by writers from minority, underrepresented, or marginalized communities. The winning submission will be awarded a $2,000 advance and publication by Dzanc Books. Finalists will be assembled in house and then passed along to our guest judges: Charles Johnson (Middle Passage, The Words and Wisdom of Charles Johnson), Chaya Bhuvaneswar (White Dancing Elephants), and Robert Lopez (Kamby Balongo Mean River, All Back Full).
Novels, short story collections, memoir, essay collections, and cross-genre works are all welcome. In consideration of the fact that reading fees can be a burden on financially disadvantaged writers, who are disproportionately writers of color, this contest has no reading fee.
This contest is open to new, upcoming, and established writers alike. Agented submissions are also eligible, and we ask that you include all agency contact information with the application. All submitted works must be previously unpublished book-length manuscripts and should include a brief synopsis, author bio, and contact information. The full work should be formatted as a Word .doc or .docx file or a PDF.
We will accept submissions from April 13th, 2020 through midnight on September 30th, 2020. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) The winning submission and a short list of finalists will be announced on the Dzanc web page by January 2021.
Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. All contest fees will go toward funding the prize as well as supporting Dzanc’s commitment to producing quality literary works, providing creative writing instruction in public schools through the Dzanc Writers-in-Residence program, and offering low-cost workshops for aspiring authors. Active and former Dzanc authors and employees are not eligible for the prize.
The Dzanc Books Short Story Collection Prize celebrates imaginative and inventive writing in book-length collections. Past winners include Nino Cipri, (Homesick), Anne Valente (By Light We Knew Our Names), Chaya Bhuvaneswar (White Dancing Elephants), Jen Grow (My Life as a Mermaid), and Ethel Rohan (In the Event of Contact, coming Spring 2021). The winning submission will be awarded a $2,000 advance and publication in by Dzanc Books.
The contest is open to new, upcoming, and established writers alike. Agented submissions are also eligible, and we ask that you include all agency contact information with the application. All submitted works must be previously unpublished collections and should include a brief synopsis, author bio, and contact information.
We will accept submissions from April 13th, 2020 through midnight on September 30th, 2020. There is a $25 submission fee. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) The winning submission and a short list of finalists will be announced on the Dzanc web page by January 2021.
Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. All contest fees will go toward funding the prize as well as supporting Dzanc’s commitment to producing quality literary works, providing creative writing instruction in public schools through the Dzanc Writers-in-Residence program, and offering low-cost workshops for aspiring authors. Active and former Dzanc authors and employees are not eligible for the prize.