Drum roll, please! We are excited to announce that the fifteen final stories for our 2025-2026 Winter Short Story Award for New Writers are in Jim Shepard’s hands. Jim has a difficult task ahead of him in selecting the top three for this year’s prize from a very strong group. Please help us in congratulating the authors whose work we selected for our shortlist this year. Thank you to every one of our submitters, as well, who year after year make this contest such a delight to review. Check back in a month for results!
“Arewa Girls” by Hussani Abdulrahim
“Cut Off” by Ioana Barbulescu
“Incognitum” by Mike Bove
“Like This” by Clare Fielder
“Gravity” by Mary Heitkamp
“The Big Reboot” by Michael Hughes Wesner
“Hulijing” by Stephanie Isan
“Wind and Embers” by Carol Keeley
“The Shoes” by Seunghyung Lee
“When Women Walked on Land” by Emily Mathis
“Tchaikovsky’s Ghost” by Candice May
“The Last Days of Raymond Roussel” by Travis Oltmann
“Sinkers” by Nick Otte
“A Modest Proposal” by Katrin Redfern
“I’m Not Here” by Mark Schimmoeller