Contest Period: Contest opens January 1, 2013 and closes March 31, 2013

Prizes and eligibility: The contest is open to non-professional writers (those who have not met eligibility requirements for SFWA or equivalent: sale of a novel or sale of 3 stories to a large-circulation publication). Previous first-place winners and current contest coordinators are also ineligible. The best story which uses the contest theme as a key element will be published in the Confluence 2013 program book, and the author awarded the first prize of $200. Second and third prize win $100 and $50 respectively. Stories may be considered for possible publication in a PARSEC INK publication. Submission to the contest implies consent for publication, but all rights revert immediately to the authors upon publication. Coordinators screen the entries, and the best submissions go on to our panel of three judges. Decisions of the judges and coordinators in all these matters are final. There is NO entry fee. Multiple submissions (maximum of 4) are allowed.

Judges: Kij Johnson, Jamie Lackey and Julie Czerneda

Format: Stories must be Science Fiction, Fantasy, or Horror genre. Stories must be original, unpublished, unsold and no more than 3500 words in length. Manuscripts should be double-spaced. Judging is blind. PLEASE REMOVE IDENTIFYING INFORMATION (E.G., AUTHOR NAME, ADDRESS, EMAIL) FROM THE MANUSCRIPT PROPER. DON'T FORGET TO REMOVE IT FROM HEADERS AND FOOTERS TOO. For electronic submissions through our submission manager, you may include contact information in the cover letter or bio box. For mailed submissions, include a separate title sheet.

How To Submit: Electronic submissions make our lives easier. Please upload your story via Submitable. If this is your first time submitting to a publication that utilizes Submitable, you will have to create an account with them. It's free.

We'll consider stories in the following formats:

• .doc (MS Word)
• .odt (OpenDocument Text -- format used by the OpenOffice.org suite)
• .rtf (Rich Text Format -- generic document format that most word processors can create)
• .pdf

If you cannot submit electronically, please send the manuscript (with either a SASE or a return email address) to:

Stephen Ramey
Parsec Short Story Contest
312 N Beaver St.
New Castle PA 16101

Theme:

Steel girders, iron grit, fey regret, the sooty breath of an industry born or lost. Time to test your metal, and send us something solid about a city (or cities) and strength. The theme need not be used literally, but the story should incorporate it in a non-trivial way.

Deadline: March 31, 2013.

Last year's winners (for the theme of "Morning After") were:

• First Place: "The Third Portal" by DeAnna Knippling, Colorado
• Second Place: "Lund" by Sean Houlihan, Connecticut
• Third Place: "Sable" by Ryan Rebel, Pennsylvania Fullerton, New York

  Judges were Christopher Barzak, Fran Van Cleave, and Susan Urbanek Linville.

  "The Third Portal" was also selected for the Triangulation: Morning After anthology from Parsec Ink.

For questions or clarifications only you may email to