Our 27th annual Tom Howard/John H. Reid Fiction & Essay Contest welcomes your entries
through April 30. The prize pool of $5,000 includes $2,000 for the best story and $2,000
for the best essay.

Our final judge is Dennis Norris II, assisted by Lauren Singer Ledoux. Winners are published
on our website.

This contest welcomes published and unpublished work. Each entry may have up to 6,000
words. You may enter as often as you like. There are no restrictions on country or age of
author. The reading fee is $20 per entry. All the winning entries and judges' comments from
the past decade are available for reading in our website archives.

ABOUT OUR JUDGE

Dennis Norris II is a 2017 MacDowell Colony Fellow, a 2016 Tin House Scholar,
and a 2015 Kimbilio Fiction Fellow. They are the author of Awst Collection—
Dennis Norris II published by Awst Press. Other writing appears in Apogee Journal
and SmokeLong Quarterly, for which their short story, "Daddy's Boy", was nominated
for a 2017 Pushcart Prize. Their story, "Last Rites", is included in the anthology
Everyday People: The Color of Life, published by the Atria Books imprint of Simon
and Schuster. They hold degrees from Sarah Lawrence College and Haverford College
and currently serve as Fiction Editor at Apogee Journal and co-host of the popular
podcast Food 4 Thot. They live and work in Harlem. Learn more on their website.