ACM has issued a call for entries from student writers for the 43rd annual Nick Adams Short Story Contest, which offers a prize of $1,000 for the author of the winning story.
| 2014 Nick Adams Contest co-winners |
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St. Olaf College |
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Knox College |
The winner is selected by a prominent writer who serves as the contest’s final judge. In the 2014 contest, author Bonnie Jo Campbell chose “The Fawn” by St. Olaf College student Zoey Slater and “Infinite” by Knox College student Alex Zimay as co-winners, and gave honorable mention recognition for three other stories.
The Nick Adams Contest, which is named for the young hero of many Hemingway stories, was established with prize money provided by an anonymous donor to encourage fiction writing at ACM colleges.
Students submit their stories to their campus English department. Stories need not have been written especially for the contest, but cannot have been previously published off-campus. Each department will select the four best entries to send to the ACM office. A small committee of faculty drawn from consortial colleges will select six semi-finalist stories, which are forwarded to the final judge.
Over the years, final judges for the contest have included such writers as Maya Angelou, John Updike, Audrey Niffenegger, Larry Heinemann, Bharati Mukherjee, Joyce Carol Oates, Anne Tyler, and Stuart Dybek.
Stories for the 2015 contest must be forwarded from the colleges’ English departments to the ACM office no later than February 13, and the results of the competition will be announced in mid-March. Students should contact the English department chair on their campus for information about the on-campus submission deadline.
Links:
- Nick Adams Short Story Contest
- Contest winners, including links to stories
- Final judges in past years
