Erika Dreifus

Each week in this space, Practicing Writing shares no-fee, paying markets for writers of fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction: competitions, contests, and calls for submissions. These weekly posts complement monthly issues of The Practicing Writer newsletter, where you’ll always find more listings, none of them limiting eligibility to residents of a single municipality, state, or province. (But this blog does share those more localized opportunities, including jobs.)

As always, if you’d like to share a specific opportunity listed here, please credit the blog for the find. Thanks for respecting the time and effort that I put into researching, curating, and posting this information! I do notice, and I appreciate the courtesy.

• First things first: The September edition of The Practicing Writer 2.0 went out to subscribers late last week. It’s packed with 85+ fee-free and paying opportunities (calls for submissions and contests/competitions) that you’ll want to check out, as well as some other worthy info.
• From the Muse & the Marketplace: “We invite all interested writers, authors, literary agents, editors, and publishing experts to apply to present at the Muse & the Marketplace 2024! The Muse & The Marketplace conference will take place fully in person at the Park Plaza Hotel in Boston from May 10 to May 12, 2024. The deadline to submit your session proposal will be Monday, September 11^th at 11:59 pm EST. Final decisions on session proposals will be sent out by the end of September after review by our selection committee.” Per the application form, “all Muse presenters enjoy tuition-free attendance, invitations to special events, a small honorarium, and more.”
• In New York, Point Leaf Press “needs a free-lance copy editor/proofreader who ideally could work in person in our office on an assignment basis.We have some flexibility but prefer applicant to be available to work in our office. We publish illustrated books on interior and landscape design, architecture. photography, and collecting. The applicant should be detail-oriented and have experience in copy editing manuscripts on these subjects. Fact checking is also required. The Chicago Manual is our source and we are a Mac office.” Compensation: “$35 to $45 (Hourly).” Apply by September 12.
• The Martin Dibner Memorial Fellowships for Maine Writers are currently open for applications; fellowships awarded this cycle will provide full funding for attending the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance’s 2023 Harvest Writers Retreat or a Fall Multi-week Workshop. As always, check the eligibility guidelines and contact the organization (not yours truly!) with any questions. Deadline: September 18. (Thanks to Funds for Writers for drawing my attention to this one.)
• Canada-based Room, which “publishes original fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, and art by folks of marginalized genders, including but not limited to women (cisgender and transgender), transgender men, Two-Spirit, and nonbinary people,” is open for submissions of “unpublished writing and art on any theme for our issue 47.2, edited by Ruchika Gothoskar, Jane Shi, Aris Keshav, and Ivy Sarkar.” Deadline: September 30. Pays: “We pay issue contributors upon publication. We pay $50 CAD per page (up to a maximum of $200) + 2 copies of the issue in which your work appears + a 1 year print subscription to Room. We pay $250 for cover art + 2 copies of the issue in which your work appears + a 1 year print subscription to Room.”
• At Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, they’re open for applications for a 2024-25 writer-in-residence. “The purpose of the George Bennett Fellowship is to provide time and freedom from material considerations to a person seriously contemplating or pursuing a career as a writer. The stipend for the one-year Fellow is $17,600, plus housing and meals. This position also offers medical and dental insurance, long-term disability coverage and access to an employee assistance program. As Writer-in-Residence the person shall live in Exeter and, in return for stipend and housing, shall (besides carrying out his or her own literary projects) make his or her self and talents available in an informal and unofficial way to students interested in writing and, more specifically, to students in English classes and to members of student literary organizations.” Note: “The committee favors applicants who have not yet published a book-length work with a major publisher (a well-financed publisher with national distribution.)” No application fee indicated (this was not always the case in the past). Deadline: September 30.
• “The Department of English at the University of Iowa invites applications for an Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing. We seek a dynamic fiction writer and teacher, who can contribute to our hybrid major by offering both creative and critical classes. We particularly welcome applications from writers who have expertise in multiple creative genres or in the following fields: African American Studies, Asian Literature, Native American and Indigenous Studies, Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies, Transnational and Postcolonial Literature, Latin American Literature, Disability Studies, and Media Studies. This is a tenure-track position.” Deadline: “Full consideration will be given to applications received by October 1st, 2023, though the search will remain open until the position is filled.”
• In Georgia, “the Department of English, Rhetoric and Writing at Berry College invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor in creative writing with expertise in fiction. In addition to traditional genres of fiction, the ideal candidate will be versatile in other narrative genres in print and/or digital environments which may include graphic novels/memoirs, speculative fiction, young adult literature, and/or screenwriting.” Deadline: “Review of applications will begin on October 15, and will continue until the position is filled.”