Flash fiction contest
The Dark Mile
Write us something scary. 1,000–2,000 words, free to enter. We are choosing 5 stories to publish — here on Halloween, and in a printed zine — the first Second Mile Press scary-fiction collection. 5 writers, paid, credited, and sent a copy of the book. You keep the copyright.
Submissions are closed — we filled all 100 places.
Thank you to everyone who sent us a story. The selections are announced here on Halloween and published the same day, and every entrant hears by email. The printed zine follows.
Questions
- Is it really free?
- Yes. No entry fee, no catch, no upsell. Future contests may charge an entry fee, but this one does not.
- How many stories can I send?
- One. We cap the contest at 100 entries so every story gets read properly, and one per person keeps that fair.
- Can I enter something I've already published?
- No — it needs to be unpublished, including on a blog, Wattpad or social media. Simultaneous submissions elsewhere are fine; just tell us if it places somewhere else.
- What happens to my story if I win?
- You keep the copyright — you are giving us permission to publish it, not selling it to us. We pay you once, put it on the site and in the printed zine, and after 30 days you can publish it anywhere else you like. We keep the right to go on selling this one zine.
- Can I use AI?
- Not to write the story — that has to be you. Spellcheck and grammar tools are fine; nobody is disqualified for using one. The line is between a tool that checks what you wrote and a tool that writes it for you.
- What happens to my story if you don't pick it?
- Nothing. Entering gives us no right to publish your work — we only read it to judge the contest. If your story isn't selected we have no claim on it of any kind.
- Will I get feedback?
- No. Every entry gets two careful reads, but we don't send individual notes.
- When do I hear back?
- We announce on Halloween and publish the selected stories here the same day. Every entrant hears by email either way. The printed zine comes later — we commission the cover once we know which stories are in it, so the artwork answers to the writing rather than the other way round.