E.M. Koeppel $1,100 Short Fiction Award

Annual Awards for Unpublished Fiction in Any Style, Any Theme

Guidelines:

  • First Place Award: $1,100.
  • Editors' Choices: $100 each
  • Ten stories will be named Stories of Distinction
  • Maximum Length: 3,000 words. Stories must be unpublished.
  • Annual Submission Period: Between Oct. 1 and April 30.
  • Award winning fiction writers are the judges.
  • No limit on number of stories entered by any one writer. Simultaneous submissions OK as long as you notify us as soon as your work is accepted elsewhere.
  • The winning short story and editors' choices are eligible to be published on www.writecorner.com and for inclusion in the permanent website writecorner.com anthology. Authors retain all rights to their works. Winners are usually announced by early summer.

How to Submit:

  1. Send one (1) typed, double-spaced copy of the story with two (2) typed title pages. Only the title may appear on the first title page. No other kinds of identification may appear on this title page or on the manuscript which will be used in judging.  (Keep a copy. No manuscripts will be returned.)
  2. On the second title page, list:
    1. Title of the story
    2. Author's name, address, phone number
    3. Short bio - about 4 lines (required)
    4. Total number of words in story
    5. E-mail address (optional)
  3. Entry Fee: $15 for a single story and $10 for each additional story.
  4. No e-mail entries accepted.
  5. Mail submission with check (no cash) made out to KOEPPEL CONTEST. If sent from outside the USA, send money order in US funds (no cash or foreign funds) to:

             Koeppel Contest
             P.O. Box 140310
             Gainesville, FL 32614

To qualify for this contest, follow ALL of the guidelines.

P.L Titus Scholarship:

If the winning story is by anyone attending a college, a university, or a school when the story is submitted, the winner will receive, in addition to the $1,100 award, the $500 P.L. Titus Scholarship. (Proof of attendance is required.) P.L. Titus Scholarship

Fees received from the contests go to payment of awards and upkeep of this site.

Origin of the Contest:

E.M. Koeppel (Emma Koeppel), Em to her friends, always craved the life of a writer but the Depression and World War II stopped her education at the university. So she turned to teaching, writing for the local newspaper, and raising a family. Courageously, in the 1960s (and in her 50s) Em Koeppel broke tradition by returning to the University of Wisconsin to live in a dorm and finish her degree. This award honors Em Koeppel's love of writing and her desire to assist and reward fine writers.

NOTE: The E.M. Koeppel Short Fiction Awards and the P.L. Titus Scholarship follow the ethics guidelines recommended by the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP). Judges review submissions with no author identification. (See contest guidelines.) The following are ineligible to receive the monetary awards: short stories already published elsewhere; stories by Writecorner editors or judges; relatives of judges or editors. Grand-prize winners are not eligible to win the grand prize again until the sixth year after winning the grand prize.