NCWN to Launch Jacobs/Jones African-American Prize
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- Written by Administrator
- Category: Network News
WINSTON-SALEM—This November, the North Carolina Writers’ Network will launch a new annual contest to honor the best in short prose by African-American writers in North Carolina.
The Jacobs/Jones African-American Literary Prize, named for two pioneering African-American writers from North Carolina, will be open to short works of fiction and creative nonfiction. The winner will receive $1,000 and possible publication of their winning entry in The Carolina Quarterly.
This award was initiated by Cedric Brown, a Winston-Salem native and graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Though Brown has lived in California the last three decades, he has “deep roots, an abiding love, and a little house in the Tar Heel State,” he said.
“The literary award was borne out of my frustration with being unable to readily find much fiction or creative nonfiction that conveys the rich and varied existence of Black North Carolinians,” Brown said. “I wanted to incentivize the development of written works while also encouraging Black writers to capture our lives through storytelling.”
The contest, sponsored by the NCWN and administered by the Creative Writing Program at UNC-Chapel Hill, is open to any African-American writer whose primary residence is in North Carolina. Entries may be fiction or creative nonfiction, but must not have been published before (including on any website, blog, or social media), and must be no more than 3,000 words.
The full competition guidelines are listed below and can be found at www.ncwriters.org.
The final judge of the inaugural Jacobs/Jones contest will be the acclaimed author Rion Amilcar Scott. Scott’s short-story collection, Insurrections, was awarded the 2017 PEN/Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the 2017 Hillsdale Award from the Fellowship of Southern Writers. His work has been published in journals such as The Kenyon Review, Crab Orchard Review, and The Rumpus, among others. The World Doesn't Require You, his sophomore story collection, is forthcoming from Liveright.
The Jacobs/Jones African-American Literary Prize honors the nineteenth-century writers Harriet Jacobs and Thomas H. Jones. Jacobs was born in 1813 near Edenton, escaping to Philadelphia in 1842, after hiding for seven years in a crawl space above her grandmother’s ceiling. She published her autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, under a pseudonym in 1861. Jacobs died in 1897 and was inducted into the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame in 1997.
Jones was born into slavery near Wilmington in 1806. Able to purchase the freedom of his wife and all but one of his children, he followed them north in 1849 by stowing away on a brig to New York. In the northeast and in Canada, he spoke as a preacher and abolitionist, writing his memoir, The Experience of Thomas Jones, in 1854, as a way to raise funds to buy his eldest child’s freedom.
The non-profit North Carolina Writers’ Network is the state’s oldest and largest literary arts services organization devoted to all writers at all stages of development. For additional information, visit www.ncwriters.org.
JACOBS/JONES AFRICAN-AMERICAN LITERARY PRIZE
Postmark Deadline: January 2 (annual)
Submissions Accepted: November 1 – January 2
The Jacobs/Jones African-American Literary Prize honors Harriet Jacobs and Thomas Jones, two pioneering African-American writers from North Carolina, and seeks to convey the rich and varied existence of Black North Carolinians. The contest is administered by the Creative Writing Program at UNC-Chapel Hill. The winner receives $1,000 and possible publication of the winning entry in The Carolina Quarterly.
Eligibility and Guidelines
- The competition is open to any African-American writer whose primary residence is in North Carolina.
- Entries may be fiction or creative nonfiction, but must be unpublished, no more than 3,000 words, and concerned with the lives and experiences of North Carolina African-Americans. Entries may be excerpts from longer works, but must be self-contained. Entries will be judged on literary merit.
- An entry fee must accompany each submission: $10 for NCWN members, $20 for nonmembers. You may submit multiple entries, but the correct fee must accompany each one.
- You may pay the members’ entry fee if you join the NCWN when you submit.
- Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
- If submitting by mail, submit two copies of an unpublished manuscript, not to exceed 3,000 words, on single-sided pages, double-spaced, in black 12-point Times New Roman font, with 1-inch margins.
- The author’s name should not appear on the manuscript. Instead, include a separate cover sheet with name, address, phone number, e-mail address, word count, and manuscript title.
- To submit by USPS:
Jacobs/Jones African-American Literary Prize
UNC Creative Writing Program
Attn: Anita Braxton
Greenlaw Hall, CB#3520
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3520
- To submit online, go to https://ncwriters.submittable.com/submit. Submittable will collect your entry fee via credit card ($10 NCWN members / $20 nonmembers). (If submitting online, do not include a cover sheet with your document; Submittable will collect and record your name and contact information.)
- Entries will not be returned.
- The winner will be announced in February.
For questions, please contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
NCWN's Critiquing and Editing Service: A Reintroduction
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- Category: Network News
Did you know the North Carolina Writers’ Network offers an ongoing critiquing and editing service for its members? Through this program, Network writers have the opportunity to open a dialogue about their work with established writers and editors of varying backgrounds and areas of expertise.
Whether you write fiction or essays, poetry or travelogues, there is a critiquer waiting to help you and your writing take that next step. Check out some recent testimonials:
"It was unbelievably helpful . . . I was totally impressed, and it was well worth the price. You have a very satisfied member."
—NCWN member Reid Wilson
"I received Betsy Humphreys' edits. They are very useful and give me much to correct but also reflect upon! Great service and a very exciting opportunity!"
—NCWN member Karin Lukas-Cox
"I have been working on my novel for quite some time and really wondered if I was on the right track. Therefore, I decided it would be most helpful to send a few pages just to see what someone thought about it. I must say, I am really glad I did, as Mr. Manchester's words greatly inspired me to continue on."
—NCWN member Jennifer Bower
Fees
All manuscripts must have a minimum of 5 pages.
|
Administrative Fee: First 5 – 50 pages: Each page thereafter: |
$30 per manuscript $3 per page $2 per page |
For example, the critique of a 100-page manuscript will cost $280:
$3 per page x 50 = $150
$2 per page x 50 = $100
Administrative Fee = $30
$280
Instructions
All prose manuscripts should be double-spaced, single-sided, with 1-inch margins and in 12-point, Times New Roman font.
Poetry must be single-spaced, with a limit of only one poem per page, with 1-inch margins and in 12-point, Times New Roman font.
Stage plays and screenplays must be submitted in proper format. Guidelines for stage plays and screenplays can be found here (courtesy of Story Sense) and here (courtesy of Writers Store).
Please number your pages.
Manuscripts should NOT be bound when submitted.
Please indicate your first preference plus two back-ups for a critiquer (see list below). Otherwise, we will select an appropriate critiquer based on availability.
To submit your work to the Network’s Critiquing & Editing Service, please send a single envelope or package with the following:
- Your manuscript, properly formatted
- A summary, synopsis, or table of contents for the critiquer’s reference (do not include this page when calculating the fee)
- Payment by check or money order, made payable to the North Carolina Writers' Network
- A self-addressed envelope with sufficient postage for your manuscript
Please mail to:
NCWN Critiquing Service
P.O. Box 21591
Winston-Salem, NC 27120
The critiquer will return the critiqued manuscript to you directly, using the SASE you provided.
If you have any questions, please call 336.293.8844 or e-mail This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
A Manuscript Consultation with your critiquer may be scheduled after the initial critique is complete, but is neither required nor guaranteed. The fee for a post-critique consultation is $50/hour, with no base fee. Please contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. if interested in scheduling a consultation.
Critiquers
For the complete list of critiquers, click here.