Scroll down for information on our annual contests.
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 $2,500 advance and publication;
- and a final contest which changes from year to year. This year, we will be running our periodic Nonfiction Prize, seeking innovative and inspiring book-length work of nonfiction, including but not limited to memoir, essays, polemical writing, historical writing, and biography. The Nonfiction Prize offers a $1,500 advance and publication.
Our contests open March 1 and close September 30. The winner of each contest, along with a short list of finalists, will be announced 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 (generally over 40,000 words, but there is no hard minimum). 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), David Tromblay (As You Were), and Nina Shope, author of Asylum, 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 All submitted works must be previously unpublished novel-length manuscripts and should include a brief synopsis, author bio, and contact information.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 March 1 through midnight on September 30. There is a $25 submission fee. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) Simultaneous submissions allowed. The winning submission and a short list of finalists will be announced on the Dzanc web page in November.
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 (generally over 40,000 words, but there is no hard minimum). 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), Julie Stewart (Water and Blood, coming 2022), and Ethel Rohan (In the Event of Contact). The winning submission will be awarded a $2,500 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. (Individual stories are allowed to have been previously published.)
We will accept submissions from March 1 through midnight on September 30, 2021. There is a $25 submission fee. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) Simultaneous submissions are accepted. The winning submission and a short list of finalists will be announced on the Dzanc web page in November.
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 Nonfiction Prize is awarded annually for the most innovative and inspiring book-length work of nonfiction (generally over 40,000 words)--including but not limited to memoir, essays, polemical writing, historical writing, and biography. The contest will be open for submissions from March 1st through September 30, 2021, via our Submittable page. The winning submission will receive a $1,500 advance and publication. There is a $25 submission fee. (Note: we will not accept physical entries.) The winner and a short list of finalists will be announced by the end of the year. There is no hard minimum or maximum on word count. Simultaneous submissions welcome.
Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. All contest fees will go toward funding the prize as well 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.