The Dialogue Only Contest is back! Contest officially opens on June 1, 2018.

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9th Annual Dialogue Only Rules and Guidelines

The Rules: Compose a short story entirely of dialogue. You may use as many characters as you want. Your entry must be under 2000 words. Your entry does not have to follow standard rules for writing dialogue. Your entry cannot use any narration (this includes tag lines such as he said, she said, etc.). These are the only rules. Manipulate them however you see fit. Check out past winners and read our tips for writing good dialogue before submitting your entry.

The Winner: The winning entry will be the story that most effectively uses dialogue to deliver a powerful and engaging story as determined by our panel of judges.

Prizes: A minimum of $500 will be awarded, with at least $300 going to the grand prize winner. Our five finalists will also be published on the website. To date we’ve awarded over $10,000 to our contest finalists including over $2800 during our 8th Annual Contest. For every entry over 50, an additional $5 will be added to the total prize money.

2018 Prize Structure:

1st Prize: $300 minimum + $3 for every entry over 50
2nd Prize: $100 minimum + $1 for every entry over 50
3rd Prize: $50 minimum + $1 for every two entries over 50
4th Prize: $30 minimum + $1 for every 4 entries over 50
5th Prize: $20 minimum + $1 for every 4 entries over 50All prizes will be paid in USD via PayPal within 30 days of the announcement of winners.

Judges: All finalists will be chosen by the Staff of Bartleby Snopes. Five finalists will be submitted to the final round of voting. The order of winners will be determined by the staff of Bartleby Snopes and our two guest judges. All decisions regarding contest winners are final. Meet our guest judges below.

About Our Guest Judges:

Nancy Stohlman is the author of many books, including the forthcoming Madam Velvet’s Cabaret of Oddities (Oct 2018), The Vixen Scream and Other Bible Stories, The Monster Opera, and Fast Forward: The Mix Tape, which was a finalist for a 2011 Colorado Book Award. She is the creator and curator of The Fbomb Flash Fiction Reading Series, the creator of FlashNano in November, and the co-founder of Flash Fiction Retreats. Her work has been published in over 100 journals and anthologies including the Norton anthology New Micro: Very Short Stories and had been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She lives in Denver and teaches at the University of Colorado Boulder. Find out more about her at www.nancystohlman.com

Caleb Echterling’s New Year’s resolution is to write more stories in the 4th person, as soon as he figures out how to break the 5th wall into the 6th dimension. His work has appeared in Jersey Devil Press and Twisted Sister Lit Mag, among others. He tweets funny fiction using the highly original handle @CalebEchterling. You can find more of his writing at www.calebechterling.com.