NOVEMBER, 2017—BULLETIN #130

Upcoming deadline:

Dorothy with her mother and brother, 1948

Family Matters: 1st place wins $2,500 and publication. Deadline: 1/2/18. (Note: The New Writer grace period ends 11/10.)

We welcome new stories about families of all configurations! (Previous online publication is fine.)

The 1st-place winner will be published in Glimmer Train and will receive $2,500 and 10 copies of that issue. Second- and 3rd-place win $500/$300, respectively, or, if accepted for publication, $700.

Most submissions run 1,000 - 5,000 words, but we are open to stories as long as 12,000 words.

We’re also running the last Very Short of 2017. Deadline 1/2. Word count: 300-3,000. First place wins $2,000 and publication. Second- and 3rd-place win $500/$300, respectively, or, if accepted for publication, $700. (Previous online publication, as always, is fine.) Submissions can be made here.

Winners and finalists of both categories will be announced in the March 1 bulletin, and contacted directly the previous week. We look forward to reading your stories!

I think if you are going to impart some kind of wisdom or truth, and have it resonate with the reader, it has to be very, very specific. When I'm teaching memoir, one of the things people worry a lot about is who is going to care about my story? Ironically, the advice given by a lot of people is that you have to make it universal. But the advice I would give is the exact opposite of that. Make it really, really specific, because that specificity is what makes your story universal. If you try too hard to sound smart and profound, it's just going to be porridge.—Joan Wickersham, interviewed by Amy Yelin

Essays in this bulletin:

Arianna Reiche: I have recently allowed myself to work in transit. I work well in motion; a lot of people do. Solitude in transit goes through a funny arithmetic, transforming into a kind of fuel. Maybe it's something from the limbic system… (more)

Chase Burke: The rules might be the rules, and the restraints of your choices might engender a certain kind of story development, but who's to say that you can't change what you’re doing? Stories are best when they surprise us… (more)

Lee Conell: A part of my mind kept monkeying toward story, even when it was avoiding the story I actually was trying to write. When I let these distractions happen, and didn’t fight them, they often led me back… (more)

Results of the July/August Fiction Open

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

• 1st place goes to Arianna Reiche for "Archive Warden."
• 2nd place goes to Randolph Thomas for "Heir Apparent."
• 3rd place goes to Sharon Solwitz for "We Enter History."

Results of the July/August Very Short Fiction Award

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

• 1st place goes to Chase Burke for "That's That."
• 2nd place goes to Brian Yansky for "The Curse."
• 3rd place goes to Ajit Dhillon for "Waiting."

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.