Fiction

Winner: Yuko Sakata of Madison, WI for “Unintended”

Finalists:

Jessica F. Kane of New York, NY, for “The Essentials of Acceleration”

Thomas Pierce of Charlottesville, VA, for “Grasshopper Kings”

Bart Skarzynski of Columbus, OH for “Project X”

Poetry

Winner: David Kirby of Tallahassee, FL

Finalists:

Steve Gehrke of Reno, NV

Cynthia Marie Hoffman of Madison, WI

Mark Wunderlich of Catskill, NY.

Essay

Winner: Peter Selgin of Winter Park, FL, for “The Kuhreihen Melody”

Finalists:

May-Lee Chai of San Francisco, CA, for “The Blue Boot”

Mako Yoshikawa of Cambridge, MA, for “My Father’s Women”

Dave Zoby of Casper, WY, for “Leftovers, 1993”

We received over 2500 manuscripts this year, and the overall quality was extraordinarily good, making our decision a difficult one.  This is of course a good thing: selecting winners of a contest should never be easy, and it certainly wasn’t for us.  We’re very thankful to all the writers who entered this year. TMR is only as good as the work we publish, and we are grateful that so many writers sent us their very best work.

We were particularly thrilled to find out, after we accepted her work, that “Unintended” will be Yuko Sakata’s first published story!

I also want to say “Thanks!” to our staff. Promotion of the Editors’ Prize began in May, months before we get the chance to even start reading the submissions. Also, there is the never-ending amount of administrative work that goes into promoting the contest. Then we had to make the tough decisions on semi-finalists, finalists, and making the recommendations for our winners. And, we pulled it off! All of this was done successfully only because of our contest editor, Claire McQuerry, who did all the hard work behind the scenes to make our contest a huge success. Her staff was once again tremendous this year. Thank you to all the editors, advisors, and interns who made it happen.

We’re making plans right now for our Editors’ Prize weekend, our annual spring reception and reading honoring the winners of the contest. Details will be forthcoming as soon as we lock down the date. The 2012 Editors’ Prize issue will be out in April. I’m positive you’ll find these stories, poems, and essays as engaging and memorable as we did.

Congratulations to Yuko, David, and Peter!

Follow Michael Nye on Twitter: @mpnye

Our Editors’ Prize is now open for submissions!  This will be the 21st year of our Jeffrey E. Smith Editors’ Prize, and we’re really delighted to be able to showcase the work of a few great writers, and toss a smorgsabord of love (publication in our Spring 2012 issue, $5000 in prize winnings, flown into Columbia for a reading and all-around fun weekend, shameless self-promotion on our site, etc.) to deserving authors. Finalists often are also selected for publication: our most recent issue has finalists in both fiction and poetry. What we’re trying to say (write?) is that this is the best contest ever.

Notice these two editors don't have Successories art on their walls.

We receive a ton of submissions to the Editors Prize, for which we are really grateful, and the sooner we can get started reading, the better. As our contest editor Claire McQuerry noted last year, submitting early to our contest is good. So, too, is submitting online, which is easy to do by going here. As an added incentive, all entries received in the month of July that request a digital subscription will receive a fifth issue of The Missouri Review for free! Five for the price of four!

We’re really looking forward to reading your work. Good luck!

Michael Nye is the managing editor of The Missouri Review.

Anna’s debut novel, The Little Bride, is forthcoming from Riverhead Books in fall 2011. Her fiction has appeared in One Story, The Georgia Review, The Harvard Review, Shenandoah, Alaska Quarterly Review, and in many other wonderful magazines. Her story, “Lotto,” which first published in The Georgia Review, received a Pushcart Prize in 2009. A graduate of Brown University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she has received residencies at MacDowell, Yaddo, and BreadLoaf. Anna lives with her husband and daughter in Providence, Rhode Island.

The spring 2011 issue will feature our Editors’ Prize winners – Anna in fiction, George Looney in poetry, and John Hales for nonfiction – as well as new fiction by Erin Flanagan and Jennifer DuBois; poetry by Nadine Meyer and Josh Booton, and so much more. This terrific issue should be out in April, just a few short weeks away!

Michael Nye is the managing editor of The Missouri Review.

We are delighted to announce the winners of our 20th annual Jeffrey E. Smith Editors’ Prize.  Let’s get to it!

Fiction

Winner: Lisa Nikolidakis of Tallahassee, FL for “Home”

Finalists:

Anna Solomon of Providence, RI for “The Long Net”

Jennifer DuBois of Palo Alto, CA for “The City of the Dead”

Erin Flanagan of Dayton, OH for “The Wrong Man”

Poetry

Winner: George Looney of Erie, PA

Finalists:

Nadine Meyer of Gettysburg, PA

Diane Seuss of Kalamazoo, MI

Josh Booton of Austin, TX

Essay

Winner: John Hales of Fresno, CA for “Helpline”

Finalists:

Peter Selgin of Canton, NY for “Titanic Obsessions”

Doug Hunt of Columbia, MO for “Names”

Molly Schultz of Moscow, ID for “On Loneliness”

We have never received so many submission for our Editors’ Prize – well over 2500 manuscripts – and the overall quality was extraordinarly high.  This is of course a good thing: selecting winners of a contest should never be easy, and it certainly wasn’t for us.  We’re very thankful to all the writers who entered this year. TMR is only as good as the work we publish, and we are grateful that so many writers sent us their very best work. So, as always: thank you!

And, hugs and handshakes to the TMR staff, too. Getting through all those manuscripts and making the tough decisions on semi-finalists, finalists, and making the recommendations for our winners – let alone all the administrative stuff that goes into promoting the contest, which began months ago – is an exhilarating challenge.  And, we pulled it off!  Big thanks to our contest editor, Claire McQuerry, and all our editors, advisors, and interns who made it happen.

The 2011 Editors’ Prize issue will be out in April.  I’m positive you’ll find these stories, poems, and essays as engaging and memorable as we did.

Michael Nye is the managing editor of The Missouri Review.

Paul won The Missouri Review Peden Prize in 2006 with his longish short story, “This Way, Uncle, Into the Palace.” He recently won the 2008 Ohio State University Prize in Short Fiction for his collection, The Departure Lounge. When he came to Missouri in November, 2006, to accept the Peden Prize, Paul graciously granted me an interview, which you can listen to online here.

Jude Nutter’s poems were selected from among several hundred entries for first place in The Missouri Review 2007 Editors’ Prize Contest. According to Poets & Writers, she recently received a 2008 McKnight Artist Fellowship from the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis, a $25,000 award.

Congrats to Paul and Jude, and kudos to The Missouri Review for continuing to publish excellent contemporary literature.