A River & Sound Review ~ Contests

A prize pumpkin seems rather fitting here. Puyallup is known for its pumpkins at the Puyallup Fair--really big pumpkins. It must be terrible to judge the quality of such pumpkins. True, the award goes to the "biggest," but what about those pumpkins with a really pretty shade of orange, or that bear an abnormal number of seeds? It goes to show, even judging pumpkins is subjective.

So even though we won't be able to award first prize to the heaviest poem or story, we will do our best to award those works that bear the most literary weight.

A River & Sound Review now holds two writing contests a year, The Duckabush Prize for Poetry and The Nisqually Prize for Fiction. Length of manuscripts and subject requirements for each category are the same as for our regular submissions. Reading period for both contests will be open from August 1 to November 30. Stay tuned for more details, or join our mailing list to receive regular updates.

Judges for our 2011 Contests are Lia Purpura (Poetry), author of the book of poems King Baby, and Kent Meyers (Fiction), author of the novel Twisted Tree.

All finalists will receive special recognition and winners will receive a $500 prize, be published in the Winter 2011 issue of RSR, and be featured on a future RSR Live podcast.

Contest Submission Rules:

~ All RSR writing contests are open to all writers, save those who are related to members of the RSR staff and final judges, and those who are current or former students of the final judges.

~ Prose submissions are limited to one story/essay per entry, regardless of length.

~ Poetry submissions are limited to three poems per entry, regardless of length.

~ Writers may submit as many entries as they choose, provided each entry is accompanied with the proper entry fee.

~ The entry fee for each submission is $10.

~ Judging of all writing contests will be conducted by the RSR staff, along with guest judges making the selection among finalists.

~ RSR will offer a cash prize to the first place entry and publicly announce the names of all finalists.

~ RSR will consider all submissions for publication in our online literary journal.

~ Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but writers must inform RSR staff if any submitted work has been accepted elsewhere and withdraw it from the contest.

Contest Submission Directions:

~ Save your manuscript(s) as a word file and make sure your name does NOT appear anywhere on the document.

~ Please include your name and contact information on the separate cover sheet provided. Include your name, full mailing address, email address, and phone number. Also on this page, list the title of the manuscript(s) you submitted. Readers of all manuscripts will not have access to this information.

~ Entry fee can be paid through the submission manager.

~ Submit your FICTION CONTEST ENTRY HERE.

~ Submit your POETRY CONTEST ENTRY HERE.

~ Or submit through our home page on Submishmash.

Previous Winners:

~ Don Colburn, 2009 Duckabush Prize for Poetry

Final Judge: Judith Kitchen

~ Michelle Peñaloza, 2010 Duckabush Prize for Poetry

Final Judge: Rick Barot

~ Jim Gish, 2010 Nisqually Prize for Fiction

Final Judge: Pia Ehrhardt