Iowa Review: Next Jeff Sharlet Contest is 2020

The submissions window for a fifth Jeff Sharlet Memorial Award for Veterans writing contest will open May 1, 2020 and close May 31, 2020. The contest is open to any service member or veteran writing in any genre, about any subject matter. (Current students, faculty, or staff of the University of Iowa, however, are not eligible to enter the contest.)

Winners of the 2018 contest were announced last fall. Selections of their work will appear in the forthcoming Spring 2019 issue of the The Iowa Review.

The contest is hosted by The Iowa Review and made possible by the family of Jeff Sharlet (1942–1969), a Vietnam veteran and anti-war writer and activist.

Unlike the first two iterations of the contest, there is no entry fee for the contest.

Prize is $1,000 and publication in The Iowa Review. Second place is $750. Up to three runners-up will receive $500 each.

Entrants should submit an original double-spaced manuscript in any genre (poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction) of up to 20 pages. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, although the editors request timely notification if the work is later accepted elsewhere.

Submissions may be made either on-line or via postal mail.

A webpage with full details and specifications for the Jeff Sharlet Memorial Award for Veterans can be found here. A Submittable page for on-line submissions is here.

Jeff Sharlet during service in Vietnam

Historically, this is an extremely competitive contest. The Aiming Circle strongly recommends that potential participants review examples of works previously recognized through this contest. Materials from previous iterations of the Jeff Sharlet Memorial contest have been collected on-line here. Or read the previous issues containing Jeff Sharlet contest awardees:

• Iowa Review Spring 2013 FREE on-line
• Iowa Review Spring 2015
• Iowa Review Spring 2017

Finalists will be selected by the editors of The Iowa Review. A winner will be selected by the guest judge. The 2018 judge was poet and memoirist Brian Turner, author of "Here, Bullet" and "My Life as a Foreign Country." Individuals with past personal or professional relationship with the judge are ineligible for the contest.

The identity of the 2020 guest judge has not been announced.

A Facebook page for The Iowa Review is here.

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