Use this form to enter up to TWO micros in The SmokeLong Quarterly Grand Micro Contest. If you would like to enter more than two micros, please see the appropriate competition entry form.

In December 2024 SmokeLong Quarterly will publish a double issue, which will include the finalists and winners in this competition alongside our usual flash narratives.
 

The Judging Process

All entries are read anonymously by the SmokeLong editors. You must remove all identifying information from the story document itself. Please make sure you remove your name from the page number heading and the filename as well. Your name should appear ONLY in your cover letter, which the judges will not see.

We make every effort to reply as quickly as possible, even during competitions. This means you will probably receive a reply within two weeks if we have decided to pass on your entries. If we are taking longer than two weeks, be encouraged. This means that at least one of your stories has made it through the first round of judging. Due to the anonymous nature of the judging process we are not able to communicate regarding which micro we are still considering.
 

The Guidelines

• Word Count: 250 words or fewer for each micro (excluding the title). Put both micros in the same document.
• Languages: English or any other language accompanied by an English translation. The story will be judged on the English text. Exceptionally this year, we are considering previously published work, so please feel free, if you are a translator, to seek out those exceptional micros from around the world--with the author's permission of course. Translator and author will split the prize money equally. 
• Previously published as well as previously unpublished work will be considered. Please do not indicate where the micro was published if you are entering a published micro. We do our best to read anonymously though we  understand that previously published work might be immediately recognized. If judges know who wrote the piece, those judges will recuse themselves. 
• The competition is open to anyone 18 years of age or older, but please be aware that you must be able to receive funds through Paypal. 
• Fiction, non-fiction, and hybrid narratives are considered.
• The line between prose and poetry is often blurry, but please take into consideration that SmokeLong does not consider poetry. 
• Please use a legible, dark font. Single-spacing is fine, but double spacing is also nice.
• Simultaneous submissions are considered, but we ask that you withdraw a single entry immediately if it has been accepted elsewhere. Please send a message to us indicating which micro is no longer available. We will see this message only at the end of the judging process, but at least we will have been informed.
• Micros published in SmokeLong are not eligible. 
• Editors on staff at SmokeLong are not eligible.
• Deadline: November 15, 2024 (midnight ET in the US)
   

The Prizes

   Grand Prize: $1000
  Second Place: $500
  Third Place: $300
  Finalists: $100
  All the above will be published in the December 2024 issue of SmokeLong Quarterly.
  A long list and a shortlist will be announced. All entrants will receive a response.
 

Before You Enter

If you're new to the micro narrative, why not take a few minutes to explore the journals that publish them? You can start with SmokeLong HERE.

 

Use this form to enter up to FOUR micros in The SmokeLong Quarterly Grand Micro Contest. If you would like to enter up to two micros, please see the appropriate competition entry form.

In December 2024 SmokeLong Quarterly will publish a double issue, which will include the finalists and winners in this competition alongside our usual flash narratives.   
 

The Judging

All entries are read anonymously by the SmokeLong editors. You must remove all identifying information from the story document itself. Please make sure you remove your name from the page number heading and the filename as well. Your name should appear ONLY in your cover letter, which the judges will not see.

We make every effort to reply as quickly as possible, even during competitions. This means you will probably receive a reply within two weeks if we have decided to pass on your entries. If we are taking longer than two weeks, be encouraged. This means that at least one of your stories has made it through the first round of judging. Due to the anonymous nature of the judging process we are not able to communicate regarding which micro we are still considering.   
 

The Guidelines

• Word Count: 250 words or fewer for each micro (excluding the title). Put all micros in the same document.
• Languages: English or any other language accompanied by an English translation. The story will be judged on the English text. Exceptionally this year, we are considering previously published work, so please feel free, if you are a translator, to seek out those exceptional micros from around the world--with the author's permission of course. Translator and author will split the prize money equally. 
• Previously published as well as previously unpublished work will be considered. Please do not indicate where the micro was published if you are entering a published micro. We do our best to read anonymously though we  understand that previously published work might be immediately recognized. If judges know who wrote the piece, those judges will recuse themselves. 
• The competition is open to anyone 18 years of age or older, but please be aware that you must be able to receive funds through Paypal. 
• Fiction, non-fiction, and hybrid narratives are considered.
• The line between prose and poetry is often blurry, but please take into consideration that SmokeLong does not consider poetry. 
• Please use a legible, dark font. Single-spacing is fine, but double spacing is also nice.
• Simultaneous submissions are considered, but we ask that you withdraw a single entry immediately if it has been accepted elsewhere. Please send a message to us indicating which micro is no longer available. We will see this message only at the end of the judging process, but at least we will have been informed.
• Micros published in SmokeLong are not eligible. 
• Editors on staff at SmokeLong are not eligible
• Deadline: November 15, 2024 (midnight ET in the US)
   

The Prizes

       Grand Prize: $1000

       Second Place: $500   

       Third Place: $300   

       Finalists: $100   

       All the above will be published in the December 2024 issue of SmokeLong Quarterly.   

       A long list and a shortlist will be announced. All entrants will receive a response.   
 

Before You Enter   If you're new to the micro narrative, why not take a few minutes to explore the journals that publish them? You can start with SmokeLong HERE.
 

You Need to Know:

SmokeLong publishes flash narratives--fiction, nonfiction, and hybrid (somewhere between fiction and nonfiction)--up to 1000 words. This word limit is firm. We do not consider poetry.

Please send ONE previously unpublished narrative at a time and wait until you hear from us before sending another. We do not consider multiple submissions. Simultaneous submissions are fine, but please consider that we usually reply within a couple of weeks (and usually much sooner). That's not long to wait for a reply. 

Include a print-ready, third-person bio and the word count of your submission as your cover letter. There is no need to include a personal note in your cover letter. We will not see it. 

Please do not include your name or other identifying information anywhere on the story document, in the filename, or in the Submittable title. Your name and bio should appear ONLY in the cover letter on Submittable, which is hidden in our blind editing process. We believe that the unpublished, unknown writer should have equal footing with the established writer. If you need to let us know that a narrative is fiction, nonfiction or hybrid, please put this information directly at the top of the story document. Please be aware that recent changes at Submittable mean that you might be referred to as "Applicant" in our automated responses. We know you're not an applicant. 

We are a scrappy bunch with lots of reading experience under our belts, but if you are submitting a narrative to us that includes (sexual) violence, we would appreciate a content warning at the top of your submission.

We pay $100 per narrative or $150 per story with audio upon publication in the quarterly issue. Payment will be issued via PayPal, and the writer may be responsible for any associated fees if applicable.

Online Rights: If we publish your work, we require exclusive electronic rights to it for 3 months and non-exclusive rights indefinitely so we can include it in our online archives.

Print Rights: We require non-exclusive print rights, for potential anthologies and promotional materials. All other rights remain yours.

You Might Want to Know Before Submitting:

As with any literary journal, the best way to understand what we're looking for is to read the journal. We have thousands of stories archived on our site. Why not spend a couple of hours browsing the quarterly issues from the last 21 years? The SmokeLong aesthetic remains an ever-changing set of principles, but it most likely has to do with these kinds of things:

     * language that surprises and excites,
     * narratives that strive toward something other than a final punch line or twist,
     * pieces that add up to something, often (but not necessarily always) meaning or emotional resonance,
     * honest work that feels as if it has far more purpose than a writer wanting to write a clever story.
 

We publish spring, summer, fall and winter quarterly issues, featuring each story with an interview in the subsequent weeks. Our intent is to respond as quickly as possible. Please allow us two weeks to inform you if we have accepted your work for publication. Rejection will sadly come much more swiftly.

We gladly consider simultaneous submissions, but please consider where you'd like your work to appear before you send it to 10 journals. We work hard to respond within 7 days. Please inform us immediately if your work has been accepted elsewhere for publication.

Finally, if you appreciate what SmokeLong does to further the art of flash, please consider making a donation through the tip jar feature, either here on Submittable or on the site itself. Although we don't charge our readers to subscribe or our potential contributors to submit, we are a paying market ($100 per narrative/$150 with audio). A tip jar donation is a much appreciated thumbs-up, and we are so grateful for your generosity.

Our decision regarding your submission is, however, in no way influenced by whether or not you donate. We also offer general feedback from three of our senior editors for $24 or detailed feedback from one senior editor for $39. If you're interested in receiving feedback on your work, please have a look at these options in Submittable. Check out our shop for our current workshops. 

We look forward to your words. Before you hit SEND, please make sure your name is removed from the story and that your word count is 1000 or fewer.

Christopher Allen

 

Use this form to receive three senior editors' comments from the Submittable queue on ONE story under 1000 words. These comments are general but actionable feedback regarding what's working and what's not. If you are looking for more specific feedback, please see below. If you do not want feedback, we offer a free submissions option and always will.

Use this form also to receive actionable feedback on a story that has been rejected by SmokeLong, especially if you received a second-tier rejection indicating that the story sparked a discussion among our editors. Please indicate RESUBMISSION in the title. 

For more detailed feedback from one editor, please use the Senior Editor Critique form. We also offer a variety of workshops and webinars including SmokeLong Fitness, the year-round community workshop of SmokeLong. If you would like to be on our workshop mailing list, please send an email to editor@smokelong.com. 

To help us give relevant and targeted feedback, please let us know whether the story is fiction, creative non-fiction, or hybrid. Please put this information directly in the story document.

Please be aware that we are editors/writers competent to give feedback on literary flash fiction (narratives under 1000 words). We may not be the right sounding board for fantasy, sci-fi, horror, romance, children's lit, etc.

Although you should use this form with the understanding that your story will in all likelihood not be accepted by the journal, if we decide to accept your submission (obviating the need for feedback), your fee will be reimbursed.

In the overwhelming majority of cases, you will receive a response through Submittable marked COMPLETED, and the editors' comments will be included in the response. We try to respond with feedback within 7 days, and we would appreciate a brief note letting us know you received our message and feedback. 

As a thank-you for using this service, we are offering a $7 discount coupon to be used on anything in the SmokeLong shop anytime before December 31, 2024. To receive this discount, please use the coupon code THANKS. Please be aware that this discount is not available on events already discounted. 

Christopher Allen

Publisher, SmokeLong Quarterly

 

SmokeLong Quarterly Senior Editors

Christopher Allen is the publisher and editor-in-chief of SmokeLong Quarterly. He is also the author of the flash fiction collection Other Household Toxins (Matter Press) and the episodic satire Conversations with S. Teri O'Type. His work has been published in over 100 journals including Booth, Indiana Review, Split Lip Magazine, and PANK. Allen has judged The Bath Flash Fiction Award, The Cambridge Flash Fiction Award, and flash portion of The Bridport Prize. A teacher and workshop leader for over two decades, Allen is a nomad. 

Shasta Grant is the author of the chapbook Gather Us Up and Bring Us Home (Split Lip Press, 2017). She won the 2015 Kenyon Review Short Fiction Contest and the 2016 SmokeLong Quarterly Kathy Fish Fellowship. She has received residencies from Hedgebrook and The Kerouac Project and was selected as a 2020 Aspen Words Emerging Writer Fellow. Her work has appeared in cream city review, Epiphany, Hobart, wigleaf, and elsewhere. She has an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and divides her time between Singapore and Indianapolis.

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness and two short story collections, Whiskey, Etc. and Thank Your Lucky Stars. Her stories have been performed for Selected Shorts and appear in Ploughshares, New World Writing, and wigleaf, as well as the anthologies Flash Fiction Forward, New Sudden Fiction,and New Micro. She served as series editor for The Best Small Fictions 2018 with guest editor Aimee Bender and is co-editor for Flash Fiction America, forthcoming from Norton in 2022.

Helen Rye lives in Norwich, UK. She has won the Bath Flash Fiction Award, the Reflex Fiction contest and third place in the Bristol Short Story Prize. Her stories appear in The Best Small Fictions 2020 and have been shortlisted for the Bridport Prize, nominated for The Pushcart Prize and published in many journals and anthologies. She has an MA in Prose Fiction at the University of East Anglia, where she was the 2019/20 Annabel Abbs Scholar.

Jasmine Sawers is a Kundiman fellow and Indiana University MFA alum. Their work has won awards from Ploughshares, NANO Fiction, Fractured Lit, and Press 53, and has appeared in such journals and anthologies as Norton’s Flash Fiction America, Best Microfiction, and Wigleaf. Their book, The Anchored World, was a finalist for the 2023 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection. Originally from Buffalo, Sawers now lives outside St. Louis.

Jan Elman Stout’s fiction has appeared in Pure Slush, Literary Orphans, Jellyfish Review, Midwestern Gothic, Pidgeonholes, 100 Word Story and elsewhere. Her flash was nominated for the Best Small Fictions anthology in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020. Jan’s flash appears in the Best Microfiction2020 anthology. Jan is currently working on a story collection. She can be reached on Twitter @janelmanstout.

Erin Vachon writes outside Providence, RI. They are the Multigenre Reviewer-at-Large forThe Rumpus. Their writing appears in theWigleaf Top 50,Black Warrior Review, SmokeLong Quarterly, The Pinch, DIAGRAM, Brevity, andThe Anarchist Review of Books, among others. Their writing was nominated for The Pushcart, Best of Net, Best Microfictions, and Best Small Fictions. They were aSmokeLongFellow for Emerging Writers, and they received an MA in English from The University of Rhode Island.

 

General Guidelines:
 

SmokeLong publishes flash narratives up to 1000 words. This word limit is firm. We do not consider poetry. On our blog we publish essays on craft and teaching flash. Please see the appropriate Submittable form.

Please send ONE previously unpublished story at a time and wait until you hear from us to send another.
     Include a print-ready, third-person bio with your cover letter. 

Our editors read blind, so please do not include your name or other identifying information anywhere on the story document, in the filename, or in the Submittable title. Your name and bio should appear in the cover letter on Submittable, which is hidden in our blind editing process.

We pay $100/story, upon publication in the quarterly issue. Payment will be issued via PayPal, and the writer may be responsible for any associated fees if applicable.

Online Rights: If we publish your work, we require exclusive electronic rights to it for 3 months and non-exclusive rights indefinitely so we can include it in our online archives.

Print Rights: We require non-exclusive print rights, for potential annual anthologies and promotional materials. All other rights remain yours.

You Might Want to Know Before Submitting:

As with any literary journal, the best way to figure out what we're looking for is to read the journal. We have thousands of stories archived on our site. Why not spend a couple of hours browsing the quarterly archives? The SLQ aesthetic remains an ever-changing, ever-elusive set of principles, but it most likely has to do with these kinds of things:

       * language that surprises and excites,
       * narratives that strive toward something other than a final punch line or twist,
       * pieces that add up to something, often (but not necessarily always) meaning or emotional resonance,
       * honest work that feels as if it has far more purpose than a writer wanting to write a story.

We publish spring, summer, fall and winter quarterly issues, featuring each story with an interview in the subsequent weeks. We invite an editor/teacher from the flash fiction community to join our team each quarter as a senior editor and workshop leader.

Our intent is to respond as quickly as possible. Please allow us up to four weeks to inform you if we have accepted your work for publication. Rejection will sadly come much more swiftly. (Note: Our emails sometimes get caught by spam filters, so please add "smokelong.com" to your allow list. We also can't respond to any third-party spam filter programs, so please don't submit to us with an email address that has that kind of security set up.)

We gladly consider simultaneous submissions, but please consider where you'd like your work to appear before you send it to 10 journals. We usually respond within 7 days. Please inform us immediately if your work has been accepted elsewhere for publication.

We look forward to your words. Before you hit SEND, please make sure that your word count is 1000 or fewer.

Christopher Allen
 

Please use this form to receive a thorough critique from one of SmokeLong Quarterly's senior editors on one story under 1000 words. Our actionable feedback will include line editing as well as a general statement concerning larger issues such as voice, point of view, tone, and characterization. This price does not include a back-and-forth with the editor. We do offer workshops in which we offer detailed feedback and lots of interaction with the workshop leaders. If you are interested in taking part in a workshop, please let us know by sending an email to editors@smokelong.com. 

But maybe you don't have time for a workshop these days. Maybe all you really need at the moment is feedback on one story. Then this is the service for you.

To help us give relevant and targeted feedback, please let us know whether the story is fiction, creative non-fiction, or hybrid. 

Please be aware that we are editors/writers competent to give actionable feedback on literary flash fiction. We may not be the right sounding board for fantasy, sci-fi, horror, romance, children's lit, etc.

Although you should use this form with the understanding that your story will in all likelihood not be accepted by the journal, if we decide to accept your submission (obviating the need for feedback), your fee will be reimbursed.

In the overwhelming majority of cases, you will receive a response through Submittable marked as COMPLETED, and the editor's feedback will be attached to the message. We try to respond with feedback within 7 days. 

As a thank-you for using this service, we are offering a $7 discount coupon to be used on anything in the SmokeLong shop anytime before December 31, 2024. To receive this discount, please use the coupon code THANKS. Please be aware that this discount is not available on events already discounted. 

Christopher Allen

Editor, SmokeLong Quarterly  

 

SmokeLong Quarterly Senior Editors

Christopher Allen is the publisher and editor-in-chief of SmokeLong Quarterly. He is also the author of the flash fiction collection Other Household Toxins (Matter Press) and the episodic satire Conversations with S. Teri O'Type. His work has been published in over 100 journals including Booth, Indiana Review, Split Lip Magazine, and PANK. Allen has judged The Bath Flash Fiction Award, The Cambridge Flash Fiction Award, and flash portion of The Bridport Prize. A teacher and workshop leader for over two decades, Allen is a nomad. 

Shasta Grant is the author of the chapbook Gather Us Up and Bring Us Home (Split Lip Press, 2017). She won the 2015 Kenyon Review Short Fiction Contest and the 2016 SmokeLong Quarterly Kathy Fish Fellowship. She has received residencies from Hedgebrook and The Kerouac Project and was selected as a 2020 Aspen Words Emerging Writer Fellow. Her work has appeared in cream city review, Epiphany, Hobart, wigleaf, and elsewhere. She has an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and divides her time between Singapore and Indianapolis.

Sherrie Flick is the author of the novel Reconsidering Happiness and two short story collections, Whiskey, Etc. and Thank Your Lucky Stars. Her stories have been performed for Selected Shorts and appear in Ploughshares, New World Writing, and wigleaf, as well as the anthologies Flash Fiction Forward, New Sudden Fiction,and New Micro. She served as series editor for The Best Small Fictions 2018 with guest editor Aimee Bender and is co-editor for Flash Fiction America, forthcoming from Norton in 2022.

Helen Rye lives in Norwich, UK. She has won the Bath Flash Fiction Award, the Reflex Fiction contest and third place in the Bristol Short Story Prize. Her stories appear in The Best Small Fictions 2020 and have been shortlisted for the Bridport Prize, nominated for The Pushcart Prize and published in many journals and anthologies. She has an MA in Prose Fiction at the University of East Anglia, where she was the 2019/20 Annabel Abbs Scholar.

Jasmine Sawers is a Kundiman fellow and Indiana University MFA alum. Their work has won awards from Ploughshares, NANO Fiction, Fractured Lit, and Press 53, and has appeared in such journals and anthologies as Norton’s Flash Fiction America, Best Microfiction, and Wigleaf. Their book, The Anchored World, was a finalist for the 2023 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection. Originally from Buffalo, Sawers now lives outside St. Louis.

Jan Elman Stout’s fiction has appeared in Pure Slush, Literary Orphans, Jellyfish Review, Midwestern Gothic, Pidgeonholes, 100 Word Story and elsewhere. Her flash was nominated for the Best Small Fictions anthology in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020. Jan’s flash appears in the Best Microfiction2020 anthology. Jan is currently working on a story collection. She can be reached on Twitter @janelmanstout.

Erin Vachon writes outside Providence, RI. They are the Multigenre Reviewer-at-Large forThe Rumpus. Their writing appears in theWigleaf Top 50,Black Warrior Review, SmokeLong Quarterly, The Pinch, DIAGRAM, Brevity, andThe Anarchist Review of Books, among others. Their writing was nominated for The Pushcart, Best of Net, Best Microfictions, and Best Small Fictions. They were aSmokeLongFellow for Emerging Writers, and they received an MA in English from The University of Rhode Island.

SmokeLong publishes essays on the subject of flash fiction on our blog. Essays will be considered for the Flash in the Classroom, Why Flash Fiction? and Flash, Back series, but we also consider craft essays and flash fiction collection Reviews. 

The Why Flash Fiction? series explores what draws flash fiction writers and editors to the form. Send us your essays about the first time you wrote a piece of flash, why flash resonates with you, your favorite piece by another writer, your experience writing a particular published flash piece, or any other topic that broadly answers the question "Why do you write flash?" We normally do not publish Why Flash Fiction essays that exceed 2000 words. Read our past essays on flash (which can be found on the blog!) to get a better idea of what we’re looking for.

Our Flash, Back series asks writers to discuss flash fiction that may be obscure or printed before the term “flash fiction”  became popular, and tell us how these older or not-widely-known works are meaningful. 

The Flash in the Classroom series invites creative writing instructors to discuss how they use flash fiction in their classrooms with the aim of inspiring other creative writing instructors around the world. We pay $25 for accepted Flash in the Classroom essays. 

Please submit a completed draft for consideration.

Book Reviews

SmokeLong is interested in reviewing flash fiction collections from emerging writers, famous authors, independent presses, big publishing houses, and everything in between. Authors and publicists are welcome to submit queries and/or books for consideration through our Submittable portal. If you are a reviewer, please submit a completed review or query letter detailing your interests and qualifications as a flash fiction reviewer. Please note that we are a flash journal and that the reviews and interviews we publish should also be 1000 words or fewer. 

Please note there is no monetary payment at this time for blog content unless otherwise stated above. 

Infos:
SmokeLong Quarterly veröffentlicht Kurzgeschichten bis zu 1000 Wörter. Für den Global Flash Feature haben wir dies auf 600 Wörter beschränkt. Bitte senden Sie uns EINE noch nicht veröffentlichte Geschichte und warten Sie auf unsere Rückmeldung.

Eine kurze Beschreibung über sich selbst könnten Sie zum Deckbrief beifügen, bitte aber KEINE persönliche Informationen im Story Dokument einfügen, da die Auswahl der Geschichte vom Gastleser anonym erfolgt.

Elektronische Rechte:
Falls wir Ihre Arbeit veröffentlichen, fordern wir exklusive elektronische Rechte für drei Monate und weiterhin das unbefristete nicht-exklusive Recht die Geschichte in unseres Archiv aufzunehmen.

Druckrecht:
Wir fordern nicht-exklusive Rechte für potentielle jährliche Sammlungen und Werbematerial. Alle weitere Rechte bleiben Ihnen vorbehalten.  

For over a decade SmokeLong has supported emerging writers through The Kathy Fish Fellowship, later renamed The SmokeLong Emerging Writer Fellowship for. As we have grown, we’ve decided to offer a program that will help not only one emerging writer per year but up to four. Are you excited about taking the next step with your writing? Read what our most recent SmokeLong Fellows, Pegah Ouji, Kelly Pedro, Dawn Miller, and Chey Dugan have said about their time with SmokeLong.

The SmokeLong Emerging Writer Fellowship 2025 — January to June

As a SmokeLong Fellow you will read the SmokeLong submissions queue for six months with our team of 17 submissions editors, gaining valuable experience behind the scenes at a lively literary journal. Reading submissions is the best way to learn what works and what doesn't in any form.

You will also have free access to SmokeLong Fitness–the Community Workshop of SmokeLong Quarterly for six months. Active participation in this workshop is expected from SmokeLong Fellows.

You will receive feedback on two drafts under 1000 words each month from at least one senior SmokeLong editor.

Application Requirements

Applicants must be

• emerging writers, meaning writers who have not published a book-length work of fiction or non-fiction;
• passionate about the form and future of the flash narrative;
• eighteen years of age or older;
• willing to spend 5-7 hours a week reading submissions;
• committed to being a lively participant in SmokeLong Fitness, the community workshop of SmokeLong;
• excited about learning.

What we want to see:

• two examples of your writing (each under 1000 words)
• a statement of your commitment including your reasons for applying for this fellowship

Ready to apply? Deadline December 15th, midnight NYC! Our new SmokeLong Emerging Writer Fellows will be announced on December 26th.