top of page

A quarterly international literary journal

2025 Plentitudes Prizes in Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry & Flash

Submission Guidelines

Four grand prizes of $1,000 each and publication in The Plentitudes is given annually for a single poem, a work of flash fiction or nonfiction, a short story, and an essay. Using only the online submission system, submit up to three poems of no more than 65 lines each, a work of flash fiction or nonfiction of up to 1,000 words, or a story or essay of 1,000 to 5,000 words with a $20 entry fee. 

Awards: Winners in each genre will receive $1,000; second-place winners will receive $300; and third-place winners will receive $200. Winners will be notified by email in March 2025 and published in the Journal's Spring 2025 Issue. 

Submission Fee: There is a $20 fee (non-refundable) for each entry.

Submission Platforms: Submit via Submittable or Duotrope from November 1 - December 31, 2024.

Deadline: The submission deadline is December 31, 2024, at 11:59 p.m., Eastern Time.

Judging: First round judging by our Editorial Staff. Final round judging by our 2025 Guest Judges:

Guidelines

  • Multiple submissions by the same writer is permitted, though each must be submitted under a separate entry. You may retain your name on the submission but you may not submit if you are personally connected to any of the guest judges and/or the editors. Simultaneous submissions are fine, as long as you contact us if the work is accepted elsewhere.

  • All writers who enter will be notified by email of the judges’ decisions, which will be final. Winners will have seven days upon the receipt of email to confirm their publication agreement; otherwise, the offer is considered rescinded. Submissions must be must be an original, unpublished work, written by the submitter. Submissions also must be primarily in English, though we welcome writers to leverage their linguistic diversity. 

  • The Plentitudes acquires First Rights for accepted works for publication. Upon acceptance of publication, The Plentitudes Journal retains the right to be the sole publisher of the works for the first year from the initial date of publication. Thereafter, contributors may republish their works, with The Plentitudes Journal credited as the initial publisher. The Plentitudes Journal retains the right to re-publish works designated for print publication in an anthology and on our social media platforms. 

  • Marginalized voices, including BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and Disability writers, are particularly encouraged to submit.

Third Annual Plentitudes Prizes

Meet Our 2025 Guest Judges
 

Fiction Prizes
Judge: Annell López

HeadshotANNELL (1) (1).jpg

Annell López is the winner of the Louise Meriwether First Book Prize and the author of the short story collection I’LL GIVE YOU A REASON from the Feminist Press. A Peter Taylor Fellow at the Kenyon Review Writers Workshops, her work has also received support from Tin House and has appeared in Guernica, American Short Fiction, Michigan Quarterly Review, Brooklyn Rail, The Common, Refinery29 and elsewhere. López received her MFA from the University of New Orleans. 

Flash Prizes
Judge: Celine Aenlle-Rocha

celine aenlle-rocha headshot_photo by caitlin aenlle-rocha.JPG

Celine Aenlle-Rocha is a Lecturer in Undergraduate Writing at Columbia University, where she earned an MFA in Fiction. She has received fellowships from the Kimbilio Writers’ Retreat, Key West Literary Seminar, Macondo Workshop, and Martha’s Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing, as well as residencies from the Hambidge Center, Collar Works, the Fairhope Center for the Arts, and Art Farm. Her work has recently appeared in swamp pink, The Brooklyn Rail, Tahoma Literary Review, Joyland, and Obsidian, among others. She is the recipient of Nimrod's 2021 Katherine Anne Porter Prize for Fiction.

Nonfiction Prizes
Judge: Melody Nixon

MN_Headshot.png

Melody Nixon (she/they) is a Kiwi-American writer, critic, and academic. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from Columbia University, where she taught creative writing from 2019 – 2021, and continues to advise MFA students. They also hold an interdisciplinary PhD in literary criticism and critical race and ethnicity studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz.

 

Melody co-founded Apogee Journal, a journal dedicated to supporting underrepresented voices in US publishing, in 2010. They also co-curated and hosted the First Person Plural Reading Series in Harlem, New York for three years, and served as the Interviews Editor of The Common for seven years.

 

You can read Melody’s essays, reviews, and criticism in The London Review of Books, Literary Hub, BOMB Magazine, Conjunctions, Electric Literature, Public Books, and Landfall, among others. Melody currently teaches at Massey University and Te Kura Toi Whakaari O Aotearoa in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa, where she lives with her partner and daughter.

Poetry Prizes
Judge: Dana Isokawa

Dana Isokawa.jpg

 

Dana Isokawa is the editor in chief of The Margins and a contributing editor of Poets & Writers Magazine. She received her MFA in poetry from NYU and lives in Brooklyn.

Congratulations to all the Winners and Honorees in 

The 2023 Plentitudes Prizes

* * *

2023 Nonfiction Prizes

Guest Judge: Nigel Collett

First Place: The Greyhound by Alan Sincic

Second Place: When You Used to Love Me by Cindy Dean Jones

Third Place: From the Blind, Peruvian Amazon by Peggy Shrum

Finalists

Experience Sisters by Sandra Eliason

Too Late by Cynthia Carlisle Fields

Irina, Act II by Madeleine Jullian

The John Problem by Judith Stiles

On (God) Mothering by Haley Swanson

Honorable Mentions

In Strange Company by J.D. Mathes

The Hurricane by Lynne Schmidt

* * *

2023 Fiction Prizes

Guest Judge: Tia Clark

First Place: No, Marty is Not on Instagram by Shayla Frandsen

Second Place: Diomedéa by Sandra Jackson-Opoku
Third Place: Empty Dresses by Lisa Michelle Corn

Finalists

American Cockroach by Rachel Chapman

The Prank Caller by Greta Klassen

Twenty Four Years Later by Iris Harris

Pigs by Ronald McGuire

Our Little Manila by Alessandro Romero

Someday I'll Love You by Sara Surani

Honorable Mentions

Easy Mondays by Lena Benenstein

Passing Strangers by Holly Woodward

* * *

2023 Poetry Prizes

Guest Judge: Leah Umansky

First Place: Love (in the Shade of Midnight Blue) by Nicole Buzzelli

Second Place: The Rock by R.B. Simon
Third Place: Echoes of Diaspora by River 瑩瑩 Dandelion

Finalists

Weedkiller by Jonathan Fletcher

Decay, 1981 by H.E. Fisher

The Sky is (Not) Falling by Hassan A. J.

Reunion by Amanda Leon

The Hungry by C.L. Liedekev

Like a Good Man Does by Rachel Mikita

Windshield Glass by Lynne Schmidt

Yegors Memory by Sylvain

Honorable Mentions

Supermarket by Eva Gonzalez

Causality Study, Bosnia, 1996 by Laura Joyce-Hubbard

romanced by wrath, unspoken by Sofia Linn Macías

Read winning pieces in the 2023 Special Prizes Issue

2024 Plentitudes Prizes

Second Annual Plentitudes Prizes
2024 Guest Judges

 

2024 Fiction Prizes
Guest Judge: Joss Lake

Joss Landscape_edited.jpg

2024 Nonfiction Prizes
Guest Judge: Daniel Allen Cox

Daniel Allen Cox - headshot by Alison Slattery 1.jpg
Mahtem Author Photo III_edited.jpg

Congratulations to all the Winners and Honorees in 

The 2024 Plentitudes Prizes​

* * *

2024 Fiction Prizes

Guest Judge: Joss Lake

First Place: Slackdrop by Jenna Bly

Second Place: The Stone Man's Harem by Helen Han Wei Luo

Third Place: Visa Gods by Ber Anena

Finalists

Nature by Dwayne Scott Davis

Sprint for Integrity by Iris Harris

Shattered Cup by Mario René Padilla

Certain Dark Things by Kayli Paulston

Small by Sharon Lee Snow

Trip, Fall by Kem Joy Ukwu

Honorable Mentions

Flight of Fancy by Paul Byall

Absolution by Nancy L. Davis

Jesus Wept by Dennis Reed

Trash by Elizabeth Quirk

White Flag by Tara Williams

* * *

2024 Nonfiction Prizes

Guest Judge: Daniel Allen Cox

First Place: I Dream of Mermaids, Memories, Shapeshifting and Serpents by Alisha Acquaye 

Second Place: The Myth of the Perfect Victim by Emily Withnall  

Third Place: A Traveling Pantry by Kosisochukwu W. Ugwuede

Finalists

Queering the Island by Robin Carstensen

family/bił kééhashtʼíinii stories by Anne Gudger

Calamity by B.C. Reynolds

Telephones by Faith Shearin

Dragonflies by Sean Wang

Night and Day by Thalia Williamson

Honorable Mentions

A Routine of Impermanence by Désirée Jung

How She Suffered by Sarah Orman

Jesus Wept by Dennis Reed

Breeding in Captivity by Amelia Skinner Saint

Snapshots by Tori Weston

* * *

2024 Poetry Prizes

Guest Judge: Mahtem Shiferraw

First Place: After I give you the great American novel by K. Hari 

Second Place: GONEWOMAN by Molly Pershin Raynor  

Third Place: Flood Elegy by Lillian Emerick Valentine

Finalists

Do You Speak Spanish? by Porsha Allen

Proxy Season by Megan Duffy

The Sunken Cathedral by Hilde Weisert

November by Caroline Wellman

Editors' Final Round Picks

Routine by AJ Baumel

Just Like It Had Before by Taylor Bland

Olam HaBa by Bay Colt

June 12, 2020 by Joy Johnston

Self-portrait as St. Petersburg by Olga Mexina

Subversion by Amanda Powell

Guadalupe by Linda Ravenswood

Father of Two by Jendi Reiter

Learning to Read a Compass by Kristen Richards

Tía rebuilds her house as she snores by Purvi Shah

* * *

Read winning pieces in the 2024 Special Prizes Issue


2023 Plentitudes Prizes
 

Inaugural Plentitudes Prizes
2023 Guest Judges

 

2023 Fiction Prizes
Guest Judge: Tia Clark

author photo.jpeg

2023 Nonfiction Prizes
Guest Judge: Nigel Collett

Book Launch, 2018.jpg

2023 Poetry Prizes
Guest Judge: Leah Umansky

unnamed_edited.jpg
Image by Tareq Ajalyakin

The plentitudes prizes

Image by Joel Filipe

Our Third Annual Plentitudes Prizes

NOW OPEN! Accepting short stories, essays, poems, and flash pieces — until December 31, 2024. See Guidelines below.

Submission Platforms

bottom of page