2015 Literary Awards

We're pleased to announce the judges for our 2015 Literary Awards in fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction! Contest submissions will open March 5; there will be a $17 entry fee for each submission, and all entrants will receive a one-year subcription to Ninth Letter. Check back here in a couple of weeks for complete guidelines!

2015 Judge for Fiction: Jac Jemc

Jac Jemc is the author of the story collection A Different Bed Every Time (Dzanc, 2014) and the novel My Only Wife (Dzanc, 2012), which was a named a finalist for the 2013 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and winner of the Paula Anderson Book Award. Her chapbook of stories, This Stranger She'd Invited In, sold out at Greying Ghost Press in March 2011. Her writing has appeared in such publications as Ninth Letter, Barrelhouse, PANK, Midwestern Gothic, and many others. She is a web fiction editor for Hobart and poetry editor at decomP.

2015 Judge for Creative Nonfiction: Matthew Gavin Frank 

Matthew Gavin Frank is the author of Preparing the Ghost: An Essay Concerning the Giant Squid and Its First Photographer (Liveright/W.W. Norton), which was named one of Shelf Awareness' Best Book of 2014. His other nonfiction books are Pot Farm (Univ. of Nebraska), and Barolo (Univ. of Nebraska); and his poetry books are The Morrow Plots (Black Lawrence), Warranty in Zulu (Barrow Street), and Sagittarius Agitprop (Black Lawrence). Recent work has appeared in The Best Travel Writing and The Best Food Writing anthologies, The New Republic, The Huffington Post, Ninth Letter, Brevity, Creative Nonfiction, and others. He teaches at Northern Michigan University.

2015 Judge for Poetry: Kathy Fagan

Kathy Fagan’s latest collection is Lip (Eastern Washington UP, 2009); her new book, Sycamore, is forthcoming from Milkweed Editions in 2016. She is also the author of The Raft (Dutton, 1985), MOVING & ST RAGE (Univ of North Texas, 1999), and The Charm (Zoo, 2002). Her work has appeared in many publications, including The Paris Review, The Kenyon Review, The New Republic, Ninth Letter, Extraordinary Tide: New Poetry by American Women (Columbia, 2001), and Poet’s Choice (ed. Edward Hirsch, Harcourt, 2006), among others. She is currently Professor of English at Ohio State University, and serves as Poetry Editor of OSU Press and Advisor to The Journal.