CLOSED FOR JULY

Please submit one double-spaced short story of up to 7500 words.    

We rarely publish short-shorts outside of our World’s Best Short-Short Story Contest. If you do plan to submit short-shorts, however, please send no more than five per submission. We don’t publish novellas and will only consider novel excerpts if they work as stand-alone stories.

   We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

Please submit no more than 5 single-spaced poems at a time, with a maximum of 15  pages per total submission. Place all poems in one document. 

Only withdraw your entire submission if none of your submitted poems remain available. To withdraw a single poem, please send a message via Submittable with the title you would like to remove from consideration. (Please notify us via Submittable only, not email.)

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

Please submit one double-spaced creative nonfiction piece of up to 5000  words. 

We’re open to a variety of forms, including memoir, travel writing, lyric essay, and hybrid work. We don’t, however, publish academic writing.

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

You don’t have to be young to read or write YA. It is a category of fiction that currently attracts readers from every demographic. The Southeast Review is interested in YA as well, so we will now be accepting Young Adult fiction submissions. 

YA is about more than just having a teenage protagonist. The work needs to take on the perspective of a young adult, not a grown person looking back on their teen experiences. If you think your story fits this category, we can’t wait to read it.

Please submit one double-spaced short story of up to 4000 words. 

We rarely publish short-shorts outside of our World’s Best Short-Short Story Contest. If you do plan to submit short-shorts, however, please send no more than five per submission. We don’t publish novellas and will only consider novel excerpts if they work as stand-alone stories.

P.S. For the category, we are open to any genre, so long as it fits under the YA umbrella.

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

We are offering free general submissions for writers who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.  

You don’t have to be young to read or write YA. It is a category of fiction that currently attracts readers from every demographic. The Southeast Review is interested in YA as well, so we will now be accepting Young Adult fiction submissions. These submissions will be capped at 100.

YA is about more than just having a teenage protagonist. The work needs to take on the perspective of a young adult, not a grown person looking back on their teen experiences. If you think your story fits this category, we can’t wait to read it.

Please submit one double-spaced short story of up to 4000 words. 

We rarely publish short-shorts outside of our World’s Best Short-Short Story Contest. If you do plan to submit short-shorts, however, please send no more than five per submission. We don’t publish novellas and will only consider novel excerpts if they work as stand-alone stories.

P.S. For the category, we are open to any genre, so long as it fits under the YA umbrella.

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

We are offering free general submissions for writers who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Please note that these submissions do have a cap, in the event that we receive more free submissions than Submittable allows us to offer. 

Please submit no more than 5 single-spaced poems at a time, with a maximum of 15 pages per total submission. Place all poems in one document. 

Only withdraw your entire submission if none of your submitted poems remain available. To withdraw a single poem, please add a note to your submission with the title you would like to remove from consideration. (Please notify us via Submittable only, not email.)

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

We are offering free general submissions for writers who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Please note that these submissions do have a cap, in the event that we receive more free submissions than Submittable allows us to offer.

Please submit one double-spaced creative nonfiction piece of up to 5000  words. 

We’re open to a variety of forms, including memoir, travel writing, and personal essay. We don’t, however, publish academic writing.

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

We are offering free general submissions for writers who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. Please note that these submissions do have a cap, in the event that we receive more free submissions than Submittable allows us to offer.  

Please submit one double-spaced short story of up to 7500 words.  

We rarely publish short-shorts outside of our World’s Best Short-Short Story Contest. If you do plan to submit short-shorts, however, please send no more than five per submission. We don’t publish novellas and will only consider novel excerpts if they work as stand-alone stories.

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

General submissions to the Southeast Review are free year-round to persons who are currently or formerly incarcerated; contest fees are also waived. 

If you are submitting on behalf of someone else, please provide your contact information in the fields below, as well as any additional information we might need to contact the person whose work you're submitting. 

Specific guidelines for submissions in any genre can be found on our main page. 

**If you are formerly incarcerated, please include a brief statement in your cover letter regarding how your experience being incarcerated has impacted you.

Note: Should a person who is currently incarcerated wish to submit directly, rather than through a liaison, we accept submissions by mail. Please provide them with the following mailing address: 

Southeast Review 

English Department. Williams Bldg. 

Florida State University 

Tallahassee, FL 32306

We do not accept any work created using generative AI.

We’re interested in interviews that balance an intimate portrayal of the writer with their work. Explore the personal, ask about the nonliterary, evoke a mood. Create context for the work under discussion, then give us a sense of how the writer identifies with a particular tradition or is trying to break from it. We encourage making connections with political and historical events so that your conversation opens to broader audiences.

Please send us a complete interview for consideration. We particularly welcome interviewers and writers from historically marginalized groups.

While you're here, check out our upcoming virtual workshops and classes!

In 1986, Jerome Stern, the then-director of Florida State University’s creative writing program, founded this contest to celebrate micro fiction. Submissions had to be under 250 words, and the winner received a crate of oranges as well as a check. Stern passed away from cancer in 1996, and though the guidelines and prize have changed since, we continue holding the contest in Stern’s memory, with a modern master of the short-short story judging the entries annually. Please send up to three short-short stories per submission. Each short-short should be no more than 500 words. Do not include personal identification information within your submissions. 

We're thrilled to have Amina Gautier serving as this year's judge. Amina Lolita Gautier is the author of four award-winning short story collections: The Best That You Can Do (2024), which won the Soft Skull-Kimbilio Publishing Prize, three International Latino Book Awards, the Midwest MLA Award, a Florida Book Award Silver Medal, a Silver Medal “IPPY” Award for Short Story Fiction, Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year Award Honorable Mention, and was a Finalist for the Housatonic Book Award and the Big Other Book Award, and was Longlisted for The Joyce Carol Oates Prize and The Story Prize; The Loss of All Lost Things (2016), which won the Elixir Press Award in Fiction, The Phillis Wheatley Award, The International Latino Book Award, The National Indie Excellence Award, a Silver Medal “IPPY” Award in Northeast Fiction, and was a Finalist for the Paterson Prize, The John Gardner Award, The Hurston/Wright Award, and shortlisted for the William Saroyan Award, and The St. Francis College Literary Prize; Now We Will Be Happy (2014), which won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize, the International Latino Book Award, the Eric Hoffer Legacy Award, a Silver IPPY Award in Multicultural Fiction, a Florida Authors and Publishers Association Award Gold Medal in Short Fiction, and was Longlisted for The Chautauqua Prize in Fiction; and At-Risk (2011), which won the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction, and received an Eric Hoffer Legacy Award and a First Horizon Award. For her body of work, Gautier has received the Blackwell Prize, the Chicago Public Library Foundation’s 21st Century Award, and the Pen/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story. Gautier has published more than one hundred fifty short stories. Her fiction appears in AGNI, American Short Fiction, Boston Review, Callaloo, Cincinnati Review, Latino Book Review, Los Angeles Review, Oxford American, Southeast Review, Southern Review, and TriQuarterly, among other places. Awards for individual stories include the Able Muse Prize in Fiction, the Anton Chekhov Prize for Very Short Fiction, the Craft Flash Fiction Prize, the Crazyhorse Prize, the Danahy Fiction Prize, the Rick DeMarinis Prize, the Jack Dyer Prize, the Lamar York Prize in Fiction, the New Millennium Writings Flash Fiction Prize, the Raleigh Review Flash Fiction Prize, the River Styx Schlafly Microfiction Award, and the William Richey Prize. She has received fellowships and residencies from the American Antiquarian Society, Breadloaf Writer’s Conference, Callaloo, the Camargo Foundation, the Chateau de Lavigny, Flamboyán Foundation, Fondazione Bogliasco, Hawthornden, Kimmel Harding Nelson, Kimbilio, Le Maison Dora Maar, MacDowell, the Mellon Foundation, Ragdale, the Sewanee Writer’s Conference, the Social Science Research Council, Ucross, VCCA, Vermont Studio Center, and the Woodrow Wilson Foundation.  

The winner will receive $750, and winners and finalists will be notified in Spring 2027 and published in our biannual issue in Fall 2027.

Only withdraw your entire submission if none of your submitted short-shorts remain available. To withdraw a single short-short, please add a note to your submission with the title you would like to remove from consideration. (Please notify us via Submittable only.)

Our poetry contest began in 1996 to honor Michael Wm. Gearhart, a Ph.D. student in creative writing at Florida State University who died suddenly at the age of 39 as he was completing the final steps of his degree. The contest continues today in his memory.

Please send up to three poems, no more than 10 pages total. Include no more than one poem per page. Do not include personal identification information within your submissions.

We're thrilled to have Li-Young Lee serving as this year's judge. Li-Young Lee is the author of several books of poetry, most recently, The Invention of the Darling. With poet Yun Wang he has also co-translated the Chinese spiritual classic The Dao De Jing. 

The winner will receive $750, and winners and finalists will be notified in Spring 2027 and published in our biannual issue in Fall 2027.

Only withdraw your entire submission if none of your submitted poems remain available. To withdraw a single poem, please add a note to your submission with the title you would like to remove from consideration. (Please notify us via Submittable only.)

Our nonfiction contest was established in honor of Dr. Ned Stuckey-French, whose legacy will last as one of service to the literary community, his students, hospital workers’ unions, and beyond. His spirit of selfless service is a model we aspire to, and his unflinching dedication to truth and its telling inspires the nonfiction we publish and produce.

We seek submissions in this vein: nonfiction that prods and pressures expectations; that speaks to the personal against the powerful; and that prioritizes soul, heart, and service. Please send essays up to 5000 words. Do not include personal identification information within your submissions.

We're thrilled to have Rose McLarney as our judge.  Rose McLarney’s collections of poems are Colorfast, Forage, and Its Day Being Gone, from Penguin Poets, as well as The Always Broken Plates of Mountains, published by Four Way Books. A book of lyric essays, Rubble Masonry, from LSU Press, is her newest release. She is co-editor of A Literary Field Guide to Southern Appalachia, from University of Georgia Press, and the journal Southern Humanities Review.  Rose has been awarded fellowships by MacDowell and Bread Loaf and Sewanee Writers’ Conferences; served as Dartmouth Poet in Residence at the Frost Place; and is winner of the National Poetry Series, the Chaffin Award for Achievement in Appalachian Writing, and the Fellowship of Southern Writers’ New Writing Award for Poetry, among other prizes. Her work has appeared in publications including American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Southern Review, New England Review, Prairie Schooner, Orion, and The Oxford American. Currently, she is Lanier Endowed Professor of Creative Writing at Auburn University.

The winner will receive $750, and winners and finalists will be notified in Spring 2027 and published in our biannual issue in Fall 2027.