SmokeLong Quarterly

Thank you to everyone who sent in work for our judges to consider this year. Narrowing down the field from 1200 entries to our nine finalists below has been a grand task for our 16 judges, an international group of SmokeLong editors and our emerging writer fellows. Thank you to these readers, who have all treated each entry with respect and positivity. All of the entries on the long list below were championed by at least one editor and are being discussed by as many as 16 editors at this very moment.

Our editorial process for competitions is similar to our process for general submissions. We initially assign two judges, and entries progress to the second round of judging if at least one judge votes MAYBE. A third judge is assigned at this point and sent to the senior editors if this judge votes MAYBE or YES. Shortlisted entries have all made it to this point. Judging competition entries is a bit different, though, from editing general submissions. We don’t edit competition entries substantively. We correct the odd typo. One misspelled word won’t knock a great story off the list. Anything larger than this would be a substantive edit, which wouldn’t be possible in a competition. For general submissions we consider substantive edits but suggest them before we offer publication.

We’ll be announcing the top 3 entries today (June 8th) on social media, so be watching for this announcement! Each of these stories is remarkable. We are thrilled to share these with the world on June 15th!

The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction Winners and Finalists

First Place – “On Trees and Treefrogs” by L.A. Strycker
Second Place – “Fruit of Our Body” by Ellen Garard
Third Place – “Small Something” by Kate Catinella

Finalists

“Death, or the Guardians of the Galaxy Ride at Epcot” by Mamie Pound
“Sugar” by Lane Michael Stanley
“Sutures” by Murray Dunsmore
“Swell” by Christopher Lee Chilton
“The Things No One Tells You When Your Mother Turns Into a Tree” by Joshua Geller Schwartz
“What Did Mike Say?” by Audrey Obuobisa-Darko