The 2018 Autumn House Press Poetry, Fiction, and Nonfiction Contests
Autumn House Press is now accepting full-length manuscripts for our annual Poetry, Fiction, and Nonfiction contests! Postmark deadline: June 30, 2018. The winner in each genre will receive book publication, a $1,000 advance against royalties, and a $1,500 travel/publicity grant to promote their book.
The judges for the 2018 full-length contests are:
- Poetry: Kimiko Hahn
- Fiction: Dana Johnson
- Nonfiction: Daisy Hernández
See our complete contest guidelines.
Congratulations to last year's winners: Melissa Cundieff's Darling Nova (poetry), Glori Simmons' Carry You (fiction), and Dickson Lam's Paper Sons: A Memoir (nonfiction). Please enjoy this selection from Darling Nova:
Rebirth
by Melissa Cundieff
When the feather appeared from my breast
I wouldn't name its color. I wouldn't
pluck it as if I would a word from a page
and allow it to disappear into memory.
When the beak broke my nose, I sang my old
language with a worm in it, and the worm dangled
with every exhale it took to conjure the distant
vowels of humanness. When the wings
made my ribs into a museum, people paid
to see. But I would not fly. Only answered
the people with a poem. The first or last line
was this: because from eye, blossoms entrance…
I don't remember the rest, except
there was you, perched on leaning stacks
of ruined books. I can't speak for much more
than wanting to pull a rock from the wreck,
to throw it at the closed window, so we
could both leave like seeds spit against the sky.
