JULY, 2018—BULLETIN #138

NOTE: The New Writer grace period ends July 10.

The Howland sisters dancing on a picnic table, sharing an ice cream cone, c. 1938 (more)

Now open: Two contests, $7,400 in prizes.

Deadline: August 31

VERY SHORT

1st place | $2,000

2nd place | $500*

3rd place | $300*

300-3,000 words

$16 reading fee

Writing Guidelines

FICTION OPEN

1st place | $3,000

2nd place | $1,000

3rd place | $600*

3,000-20,000 words

$21 reading fee

Writing Guidelines

*Or, if accepted for publication, $700.
(1st place stories are always published and every story is read and considered for publication.)

Both categories are open to all writers. Winners and finalists will be announced in the November 1 bulletin, and contacted directly the previous week.

Why print publication? Agents keep a sharp eye out for promising emerging writers, and book publishers need to be pretty confident that the books they choose to publish will be well received by readers. When we accept a story for publication in Glimmer Train, we are committing to paying the writer well and to providing professional copy editing and proofreading, so your story is at its very best. Agents and publishers know that when we present a story, we think the story's a knockout, and deserves all that goes into its publication. Our authors think so, too.

I always thought that if you could keep the conceptualizing mind—the writer mind that wants to pull the big manure truck with your politics and your thematics in it and dump it on the reader—if you can keep it quiet, then things like meaning and politics…they're almost like shy animals. They'll come out of the woods, but you have to stay very still. You have to pretend you're not interested in them. "Don't bother me right now, I'm making a joke,"" or, "I'm trying to make this living room."" But because the writer, of course has all those things going on, those other things will leach in and come in so honestly, and they won't be abstract, but intimately linked to action and character.—George Saunders, interviewed by David Naimon

Essays in this bulletin:

Kari Lund-Teigen: A short story builds in my mind in a haphazard way, so it feels dishonest to describe it as a process. But I've been at this for a while now and while my ideas for what works for a story are constantly tuned by experience. (more)

Les Myers: About to leave for Eastern Siberia and Mongolia when we contacted him about his first-place win, Les Myers didn't have time to write a craft essay, but we look forward to including it in an upcoming bulletin! (more)

Myla Goldberg: When you're writing fiction, you don't ever have to use anything real if you don't want to, but it's a lot easier. If you're trying to create a convincing setting, you want to start with reality. (more)

Results of the March/April Fiction Open contest

Winners have been contacted, as have the Top 25 and Honorable Mentions.

• 1st place goes to Les Myers for "Beth Nine."
• 2nd place goes to Katrin Gibb for "A History of Regressing."
• 3rd place goes to Emily Greenberg for "From the Eyes of Travelers."

Results of the March/April Very Short Fiction contest

Winners have been contacted, as have the Top 25 and Honorable Mentions.

• 1st place goes to Kari Lund-Teigen for "Crow Advice."
• 2nd place goes to Lindsay Haber for "Jewish Relatives Talking About My Sex Life."
• 3rd place goes to Brian Cousins for "Our Fathers."

Our thanks to all of you for letting us read your work!

Feel free to forward this bulletin to your writer friends. As you know, the bulletin is free and meant to inform and to promote writers. (We never share your info.) People can sign up for bulletins themselves here. Missed a bulletin? They're archived here.

Best regards,

Discovering, publishing, and paying emerging writers since 1990.

One of the most respected short-story journals in print, Glimmer Train continues to actively champion emerging writers. The magazine is represented in recent editions of the Pushcart Prize: Best of the Small Presses, New Stories from the Midwest, the O. Henry Prize Stories, New Stories from the South, Best of the West, New Stories from the Southwest, Best American Short Stories, and The Best American Nonrequired Reading.