. . . And We Start Accepting Submissions For Our Fall Contest On August 1

Since 2015, when The Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award began, winners and honorable mentions have included writers who had never before published a single word—as well as writers who had already received broad acclaim for their novels, nonfiction books, short fiction, poetry, and articles of all kinds.

Lisa Taddeo, author of our our summer 2017 TGS Fiction Award-winning story, “The Donegal Suite,” is one of the latter. At the time she submitted “The Donegal Suite,” she had already earned the first of her two Pushcart Prizes for a short story, as well as attracted a great deal of attention for her nonfiction articles in Esquire and other magazines. 

Recently, Lisa also published her first book—a wonderful and searching piece of nonfiction titled Three Women, which has already gotten a great deal of attention in the media. We wanted to tell TGS readers about her book—and also to say congratulations to its author.

Rather than summarize “Three Women,” you can read more about it on its official publisher’s page.

Meanwhile keep in mind that very soon we will begin accepting submissions for our fall competition. If you’re a writer, and you are thinking about submitting a piece, please have a look at our contest guidelines. 

Beyond that, we hope you’re having a great summer. 

We Publish The Winners On Halloween!

The Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award is a biannual competition with cash prizes of $1,000 for the winner and $250 for each of two honorable mentions. On Midsummer’s Eve and Halloween, we publish the three stories we have selected in the most recent running of the contest.

Believe it or not, Halloween is not that far off, and we’ll begin accepting submissions for our fall contest on August 1. If you’re interested, you’ll find the contest guidelines here.

And if you’d like to read our past winning and honorable mention stories, you’ll find them here.

Happy Solstice!

0ur summer 2019 Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award-winning stories are now published. Have a look!

Our Summer 2019 Supernatural Fiction Award

By deadline time at the end of April, The Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award competition had received its largest-ever number of submissions, at well over 300. We’ve been doing a lot of reading since then, and we’re almost ready to publish the winning story and two honorable mentions.

As always, the big reveal will take place on the Summer Solstice—June 21—right here on The Ghost Story website. Also as always, each story will be accompanied an original Andy Paciorek custom illustration. For some chilling reads at the start of summer, make sure you check back with us on the longest day of the year.

And if you entered our contest . . . you may already have heard from us about your work. If you haven’t, we’ll be in touch before the 21st. In all cases . . . thank you for participating in our biannual supernatural story event. Cheers — The Editor

Our Supernatural Story Contest Is Closed

The summer 2019 Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award contest is now closed to submissions. To everyone who participated: Thank you! We’ll be in touch with you between now and Midsummer’s Eve, when we’ll publish the winner and two honorable mentions.

If you had intended to enter our competition and didn’t quite get your story in on time . . . don’t despair. Our fall contest—with the same $1,000 first prize, $250 for honorable mention, and both print and online publication—opens for submission on August 1.

Until then, Cheers—The Editor

Our Supernatural Fiction Award

The deadline for The Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award is April 30. If you’ve got a story you want to submit, but you haven’t uploaded it by the time April slides into May . . . you’ll have to wait for our fall competition, which runs from mid-August until September 30. You’ll find our contest guidelines and access to our online story submission system right here.

For Your Reading Pleasure

The winner and three honorable mentions in our annual Screw Turn Flash Fiction Competition are now available for your enjoyment. Have a look. 

“I want to tell you that everyone that is dreaming of a parable—of using the genre of fantasy to tell the stories about things that are real in the world today—you can do it. This is a door; kick it open and come in.”

— Guillermo del Toro, on accepting the Oscar for Best Picture

You Were Warned!

We told you that on the Solstice we’d be publishing the winner of The Summer 2017 Ghost Story Supernatural Fiction Award competition, along with two honorable mentions. Well, that time is upon us, and all three stories are now available to give you a chilling summertime reading experience. Enjoy.

As for our fall Fiction Award . . . it opens for submissions on August 7, with a deadline of September 30, and Halloween publication for the winners. As with our summer contest, cash prizes are $1,000 for the winner, as well as $250 and $100 for the Honorable Mention and Second Honorable Mention, respectively. Click here for complete guidelines.