This award is given in honor of writer, teacher, and editor Jeanne M. Leiby, former editor of The Florida Review and The Southern Review. The award is for a single-author standalone chapbook of Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Graphic Narrative, or Hybrid work. We do not consider any poetry for the chapbook contest at this time.

You may submit a long story or essay, several short stories or essays, a flash prose collection, or a graphic narrative (black & white only). Please identify the genre in your cover letter, and please include a Table of Contents with your submission.

Length limit: up to 45 pages, double-spaced, 12 pt. font. For graphic narrative, please submit a jpeg or PDF.

DEADLINE: January 7, 2024

PRIZE: Chapbook publication, 50 copies of the winning chapbook, and $1,000.

All entrants receive a free one-year subscription to The Florida Review.

Contest manuscripts should not have your name or other identifying information on any page. Please note that if your name is drawn into a panel of a graphic narrative, it should be blacked out (temporarily, for contest submission purposes only).

Pieces may be previously published in journals or anthologies but must not have appeared in a published story collection or essay collection, chapbook, or single-author volume of any kind. Finalists with previously unpublished selections may receive offers of journal publication by The Florida Review or Aquifer: The Florida Review Online.

Simultaneous submissions are perfectly fine as long as they are withdrawn immediately upon acceptance elsewhere.

You have the option to add on a copy of the winning chapbook to your submission at a deeply discounted rate.

Our magazine is a home for the real and the weird alike. We love realism. We love fabulism. We love when the ordinary proves extraordinary. We love when the wild is tamed. You can’t freak us out. Or, we dare you to try. Bring us your minimalist work, your maximalist prose, your most psychologically grounded or searingly meta. Anything with sentences that sing. We love voice-driven pieces. We love narrative play. We love risk. We love momentum and noise, as well as quiet and calm. We revere subtlety.

We publish everything from flash fiction to long stories up to 9,000 words. Please submit only one story at a time. However, we will read up to three short-shorts in one submission if the total page count remains under 15 pages. 

Novel excerpts will be considered only if they stand alone as stories.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

Aquifer is the online literary supplement to The Florida Review print edition. As with the print magazine, we love literary fiction that takes risks!

Our magazine is a home for the real and the weird alike. We love realism. We love fabulism. We love when the ordinary proves extraordinary. We love when the wild is tamed. You can’t freak us out. Or, we dare you to try. Bring us your minimalist work, your maximalist prose, your most psychologically grounded or searingly meta. Anything with sentences that sing. We love voice-driven pieces. We love narrative play. We love momentum and noise, as well as quiet and calm. We revere subtlety.

We publish everything from flash fiction to long stories up to 9,000 words. Please submit only one story at a time. However, we will read up to three short-shorts in one submission if the total page count remains under 15 pages. 

Novel excerpts will be considered only if they stand alone as stories.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

We’re interested in poems with emotional and intellectual depth, poems that have texture and verve. Whether experimental or traditional, we want poems that move and surprise us in their use of imagery, voice, music, wordplay, and formal invention. We welcome all styles, including prose poetry and hybrids. Please submit no more than five poems at a time.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

Aquifer is the online literary supplement to The Florida Review print edition. As with the print magazine, we’re interested in poems with emotional and intellectual depth, poems that have texture and verve. Whether experimental or traditional, we want poems that move and surprise us in their use of imagery, voice, music, wordplay, and formal invention. We welcome all styles, including prose poetry and hybrids. Please submit no more than five poems at a time.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

Send us your best CNF! We welcome memoir, braided essays, lyric essays, hermit crab essays, fragmented essays, flash nonfiction, and hybrid work. We welcome submissions of literary journalism or reportage, so long as the essay maintains a personal element. We do not publish scholarly essays at this time.

We accept prose pieces up to 30 manuscript pages (9,000 words). Please submit only one essay at a time. However, we will read up to three flash pieces in one submission if the total page count remains under 15 pages. We consider memoir excerpts if they stand alone.

Please do not submit book reviews or interviews here. Those items have their own submission categories.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

Aquifer is the online literary supplement to The Florida Review print edition. As with the print magazine, we invite you to send us your best CNF! We welcome memoir, braided essays, lyric essays, hermit crab essays, fragmented essays, flash nonfiction, and hybrid work. We welcome submissions of literary journalism or reportage, so long as the essay maintains a personal element. We do not publish scholarly essays at this time.

We accept prose pieces up to 30 manuscript pages (9,000 words). Please submit only one essay at a time. However, we will read up to three flash pieces in one submission if the total page count remains under 15 pages. We consider memoir excerpts if they stand alone.

Please do not submit book reviews or interviews here. Those items have their own submission categories.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. If you select this option, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

We consider graphic narrative that shows both artistic and literary merit. We prefer work that is character- and story-driven, whether fiction, nonfiction, or poetry. We consider experimental and traditional work.

We consider graphic narrative submissions for publication in The Florida Review print magazine and in Aquifer: The Florida Review Online. We consider what might be best for the art and the text in each individual comic before deciding whether a piece could appear online or in print. In the event of an acceptance, we will discuss your preference, or you may indicate a preference in your cover letter.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. Should you choose to do so, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

All book reviews are published in Aquifer: The Florida Review Online in order to offer the widest possible readership for authors with new books.

We seek reviews of recent full-length books, especially those published by small literary and university presses in the past 12 months. Length: 500-1,500 words. We do not review self-published books.

We also consider review essays–extensive examinations of multiple works that go beyond straightforward reviews. Please query before submitting a longer review essay.

Please note that you will be given the opportunity to "add on" a subscription to this submission. Should you choose to do so, you will receive a discounted submitter rate of $18.00 for a 1-year subscription.

Aquifer: The Florida Review Online is now accepting submissions of author interviews. Guidelines:

* The author should have at least one published full-length book.

* We generally publish interviews that run 2,000 to 5,000 words. Please be sure that your interview is shaped and edited, not just a transcription of a conversation. Interviews should demonstrate focus, purpose, and concision.

* You will need to attest to the fact that you have permission from the interviewee to publish the interview. All interviewees must approve the final copy. Please provide us with contact information for the author being interviewed.

* We like to run photos of authors alongside their interviews, so please be prepared to acquire a picture from the author (or provide us with the necessary contact information).

We consider black and white art for interior pages and color art for covers. Artists may submit up to four works for consideration.

We ask your understanding that we often hold onto visual art submissions for some time. Because we only print two issues and one chapbook a year--and because the moods and themes of these are often determined by the content--we sometimes keep older submissions on hand in case there's a match. We don't mean to keep anyone hanging, and we understand that you will be simultaneously submitting your work elsewhere as well. If we hold onto your submission for too long, please don't hesitate to withdraw it. Thank you for your patience and for considering The Florida Review as a home for your work.