the ihlr chapbook

 

 

For the 2022 Chapbook Competition, we will select a winning collection of prose. Manuscripts should be 40 - 56 pages with each story/chapter/essay starting on a new page. The winning manuscript will be published in the Fall of 2022 as a separate issue (Volume 24.4). Full-color cover art will reflect the collection’s content and emphasize its title, not the name of Iron Horse. The published chapbook will look like the single-author book that it is. The winner also receives a $1,000 honorarium and 15 copies.

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Due to Covid-19 budget cuts, the editors at Iron Horse will serve as judges until our full budget is reinstated.

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guidelines

 

• Entries for prose chapbooks should be between 40 and 56 pages, with each story/chapter/essay starting on a new page. (In years when we are considering poetry chapbooks, manuscripts must be between 28 and 36 pages, with each poem starting on a new page.)

• Manuscripts must be typed, with one-inch margins, 12-point font.

• While individual portions of the chapbook may have been published elsewhere, the chapbook as a whole must be previously unpublished.

• The author’s name and  contact  information  must  appear  on  the  Submittable  form, but it must NOT appear anywhere on the manuscript. There should be no footers or headers containing the author's identity. And no bio page. Manuscripts with biographical information will be disqualified.

• Do not include acknowledgments of previous publications. Manuscripts including an acknowledgments page will be disqualified. • Pages must be numbered.

• The $18 entry fee includes a year's subscription to IHLR.

• We only accept electronic manuscripts, submitted as ONE pdf file, with the entire chapbook in that single file. 

•  Submissions will be accepted between January 15 and March 15. 

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free submit day

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We will accept 25 free submissions on March 1, 2022. On that day, we will open a special gate, revealed on our social media pages (connect with us below) and here on our website. We will accept only one free submission per person (automatically disqualifying subsequent free submission attempts), and we will only accept the first twenty. Once we hit 25 submissions in the free gate, we will close it. Free submissions will not receive a subscription. We offer this opportunity in the hopes of targeting writers who cannot afford to enter otherwise. If you can afford to enter, please do not take one of the 25 available free slots.

 

January 15, 2022 to March 15, 2022: Submit here.

To submit on March 1 for free (with no subscription): Submit here on that day.

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results

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We'll announce finalists and the winner here, the finalists in late spring, the winner during the summer.

2022 semi-finalists

Robert Barham, Jars of Daybreak (nf)

Maryah Converse, Consequences (nf)

Jackie Craven, Featherfall (f)

Michael Horton, If Everything Would Just Stand Still (f)

Jill McCabe Johnson, Dead Reckoning (nf)

Matt Knutson, In the Hills

Christine Kwon, The Lady of Cut Flowers (f)

Saul Lemerond, What Was Black Dots Is Now People (f)

Wendy Oleson, To Suture; To Bind (f)

Marc Sheehan, The Birth of Exurbia (f)

Alan Sincic, Portable Glory (f)

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2022 finalists

Shuly Xóchitl Cawood, Having It Out with Love (nf)

Dustin Hoffman, A Sky So Sharp (f)

Ingrid Keenan, Smile: Five Stories (f)

Erica Plouffe Lazure, Fall of Athens (f)

William Torrey, Freedom of Movement (f)

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2022 winner!

Shuly Xóchitl Cawood

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