January Top Picks: Opportunities for Writers
The January 2018 edition of "Writing Life Essentials," a monthly hand-curated list of contests, grants, scholarships, submissions calls, and awards, with a focus on opportunities that are at least one of the following: local, free to apply, and/or committed to celebrating and supporting writers from historically marginalized communities. We do the research, so you have more time for what matters: the writing. Or, the penning moody self-portraits in the margins of your notebook. That matters too.
Contests & Awards
$ Submissions to the 92Y / Boston Review Poetry Contest.
Fee: $15; Award: $500, publication & residency; Deadline: Jan 12.
This year’s preliminary judges are Timothy Donnelly and A. H. Jerriod Avant; final judges are Craig Santos Perez, Srikanth Reddy and Dara Wier.
Free Submissions to the Stacy Doris Memorial Poetry Award.
Fee: $0; Award: $500 & publication; Deadline: Jan 15.
Minimum 3 pages; maximum 10 pages. Maximum 1 poem per author. Poems submitted for the award will also be considered for publication in Fourteen Hills.
Free Submissions to the Andrés Montoya Poetry Prize for Latinx Poets.
Fee: $0; Award: $1,000 & publication; Deadline: Jan 15.
Supports the publication of a first full-length book of poems by a Latinx poet. The winning poet will receive a contract from University of Notre Dame Press. Upon publication of the winning book, Letras Latinas will extend an invitation to both the winner and the judge to give a joint reading at Notre Dame.
The Waterman Fund invites emerging writers to submit personal essays between 2000 and 3000 words on the topic of wilderness and wildness. The runner-up essay will receive $500. Both will be published in online and in Appalachia. For the purposes of this contest, an emerging writer is considered someone who has a solid writing background or interest, but has not yet published a major work of prose on this topic or been featured in national publications.
Fellowships & Residencies
$ Submissions for the Writers Room of Boston Gish Jen Fellowship for Emerging Writers
In order to help mentor the next generation of Asian American writers, Kundiman sponsors an annual Retreat in partnership with Fordham University. During the Retreat, nationally renowned Asian American poets and writers conduct Master Classes and manuscript consultations with fellows. Readings, writing circles and informal social gatherings are also scheduled.
Free application for the Philip Roth Residence at Bucknell University for poets.
Free application for the U.S.-Japan Creative Artists Fellowships.
Free application for the Olive B. O'Connor Fellowship in Creative Writing at Colgate University.
General Submissions

Colwill Brown
Colwill is an instructor and manuscript consultant at GrubStreet, an associate editor at Bat City Review, and an MFA candidate at the University of Texas at Austin. After graduating a scholarship awardee of GrubStreet’s Novel Incubator program, Colwill found representation for her first novel, Before We Tear Our Selves Apart, with Robert Guinsler of Sterling Lord Literistic, which is currently on submission to publishing houses. She is the recipient of the Wellspring House Emerging Writer Fellowship, the Henry Blackwell Essay Prize, and a Crawley-Garwood Research Grant, and has received fellowships and support from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, The University of Texas at Austin, Boston College, Kansas State University, the Anderson Center for Disciplinary Studies, and GrubStreet. She was a finalist for the 2019 Tennessee Williams Fiction Prize, the 2019 Reynolds Price Award, the 2019 Far Horizons Fiction Award, the 2019 Disquiet International Literary Prize, and the 2019 Lit Fest Emerging Writer Fellowship. Colwill’s fiction is forthcoming in Granta and is anthologized in Everywhere Stories: Short Fiction from a Small Planet (Press 53). She has served on the editorial team for Post Road magazine, The Conium Review, Solstice Literary Magazine, and Pangyrus magazine. Colwill is a founding member of the Back Porch Collective, a Boston-based group of writers. With members connected to Cuba, India, Albania, Atlanta, Bosnia, Miami, Jamaica, and the UK, they bonded over a common passion for global narratives and literature’s potential to create empathy and understanding across all geographical, political, and cultural borders. Hailing from Yorkshire, in the north of England, Colwill is determined to introduce the word “sozzard” to the American vernacular. For a full list of publications, projects, and services, please visit colwillbrown.com.
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