Thank you for your interest in submitting your manuscript to the 16th annual Boa Short Fiction Prize! 

Since its founding in 2010, the Boa Short Fiction Prize has been awarded to ten of the most exciting and unique voices in American fiction. As with all Boa fiction titles, our prize-winning short story collections are more concerned with the artfulness of writing than the twists and turns of plot. It is our belief that short story writing is a valuable and underserved literary form that we are proud to support, nurture, and celebrate.  

Winner Receives:  

• Book publication by Boa Editions in spring 2028
• $1,000 honorarium

 Contest Period: April 1 – May 31, 2026 *Submission fee: $30 *Please note that submission fees allow us to offer a $1,000 honorarium and also offset the cost of publishing and promoting the winning collection. As a non-profit literary publishing house, we understand that submission fees can be difficult to accommodate. Please know that 100% of your fee will go toward supporting the publication of an excellent short story collection and to supporting Boa’s mission to bring the highest quality literature into the world.  All submissions will be personally read, reviewed, and considered by Boa Publisher Peter Conners, founder and sole editor of Boa’s short fiction series. Manuscripts that do not win the contest are still eligible for publication by Boa. 

Submission Guidelines: 

• Submissions are invited only through Submittable or post mail. We do not have the staff capacity to read or respond to manuscripts that are submitted by email.
• Submit one copy of the manuscript and the $30 entry fee between April 1 and May 31, 2026.
• The Submissions form will close at 11:59 PM EDT on May 31, 2026. Late submissions will not be accepted.

 Eligibility: 

• Entrants must be a U.S. citizen, a legal resident of the U.S., or have Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) status, Temporary Protected Status (TPS), or Legal Permanent Status (LPS).
• Entrants must be at least 18 years of age.
• Translations, novels, and novellas are not eligible.
• Individual stories from the manuscript may have been published previously in magazines, journals, anthologies, chapbooks, or self-published books, but must be submitted in manuscript form.
• Employees, volunteers, and board members of Boa Editions, or their partners, spouses, or immediate families, are not eligible to submit.
• Authors of Boa titles in other genres and translators who have been under contract with Boa are not eligible to submit.

 Manuscript Format: 

• Minimum of 90 pages; maximum of 200 pages.
• At least 12 pt. font, typed, double-spaced.
• Name, address, telephone number, and email address must appear on the title or cover page of the manuscript.
• Do not send artwork or photographs.
• File saved as PDF or Word format (e.g. .DOCX, .DOC, .RTF) 
• Paginated consecutively with a table of contents
• Attach publication acknowledgments, if any.
• Neither late nor early manuscripts will be accepted.
• Contestants may submit the manuscript elsewhere simultaneously, but must notify Boa Editions immediately if a manuscript is accepted by another publisher.
• Once submitted, manuscripts cannot be altered. The winner will be given the opportunity to revise before publication. 
• Contestants may submit more than one manuscript, but a separate entry fee and entry form must accompany each manuscript.

 Answers to FAQs: 

• The winner will be announced by September 2026.
• The honorarium will be awarded in two parts: one part upon receiving a signed contract, the second part upon publication.
• The winning manuscript will be published in spring 2028, in an original paperback edition and an e-book edition of the American Reader Series.
• The winner will retain full copyright of their work.
• In the unlikely event that a suitable manuscript cannot be found, Boa Editions reserves the right not to award a prize.

Blessing the Boats Selections: 2026

Open: May 1 - June 15 (portal closes at 11:59PM on June 15th)

2026 Editor-at-Large: Evie Shockley 

One Poet Receives: 

• Book publication by Boa Editions in Fall 2028
• $1,500 honorarium

Blessing the Boats Selections spotlights poetry collections by women of color. As the 2021-2023 Blessing the Boats Selections Editor-at-Large, Aracelis Girmay will read submissions and select the final manuscript for publication. Blessing the Boats Selections is named after Lucille Clifton’s National Book Award-winning collection, Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems (Boa, 2000), in honor and celebration of her enduring legacy. Lucille Clifton's writings of Black life and Black female life have shaped a sense of what is possible for so many. In the poem that begins "won't you celebrate with me," she writes: "born in babylon / both nonwhite and woman / what did i see to be except myself?" Blessing the Boats Selections titles walk behind and grow out of the poetry of those lines. Submissions are thus open to all women poets of color in the U.S., including poets who identify as cis, trans, and non-binary people who are comfortable in a space that centers on women’s experiences, regardless of citizenship and publication history. Our hope is that the Blessing the Boats Selections will further facilitate encounters between readers and writers of some of the most extraordinary texts of our time.

Please see the guidelines below for details.   

Submission Guidelines:

We accept submissions via Submittable or by mail.

• There is no submission fee associated with this reading period.
• Manuscript should be a minimum of 65 pages, maximum of 120 pages of poetry.
• Submit only one book-length, complete manuscript at a time. If two manuscripts are sent, both will be removed from consideration.
• Manuscript text should be at least 12 pt. font. Manuscript pages should be one-sided.
• Include a cover letter. Do not include a résumé or vitae.
• Please include your phone number and/or email address on the cover letter.
• Simultaneous submissions are okay. Note simultaneous submissions in your cover letter and notify BOA immediately should your submission be accepted elsewhere.
• Include title, publisher, and publication year of previous full-length poetry collections you have published, if any. Feel free to include an acknowledgments page for any previously published poems in your manuscript. 
• Family members, or any students who have studied poetry or fiction or literature with Evie Shockley in the past four years, whether that be through a university, a community setting or a tutorial are prohibited from consideration.

Additional Guidelines for Print submissions:

• Send the manuscript ATTN: BLESSING THE BOATS SELECTIONS.
• Include a self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) with sufficient return postage.
• Please note that manuscripts will be recycled, not returned.
• Submissions may be mailed to:

Boa Editions, Ltd. ATTN: Blessing the Boats Selections 250 North Goodman Street, Suite 306 Rochester, NY 14607

Answers to FAQs:

• The winner will be announced in Fall 2026.
• The winning manuscript will be published in Fall 2028, in an original paperback edition and an e-book edition of the American Poets Continuum Series, with a standard royalties package.
• The winner will retain full copyright of their work.
• The paper from all manuscripts will be recycled after the winner is announced.
• Boa Editions assumes no responsibility for loss of manuscripts.
• As this is an open reading period rather than a contest, submissions are not read blind.