Arch Street Press is pleased to award its annual prize chosen from America's top undergraduate and graduate student writers in the nonfiction and fiction categories. The Arch Street Prize is designed to stimulate interest in writing across the country and to promote today's extraordinary young writers. Arch Street Press offers each winner a standard book contract for a future work, together with a mentoring program and $1,000 cash prize.
eligibility
Any writer between the ages of 18 and 30 who has not previously published a volume of nonfiction or fiction prose is eligible to enter the competition. Writers must submit proof of enrollment (a transcript or letter from a school official confirming his/her status as an undergraduate/graduate student) from an accredited U.S. institution. Writers are still eligible if they are living abroad while enrolled in a graduate or undergraduate program in the U.S.
manuscript submissions
The manuscript must be a word-processed work of nonfiction or fiction that does not exceed 10,000 words. We accept both email (preferred) and postal mail submissions. Please include a cover sheet with your name, address, phone number and the title of your manuscript. Put your name on the cover sheet only; to ensure that every manuscript finalist is evaluated with the utmost fairness, all manuscripts are submitted to the judges without any identifying material. Enclose a stamped, self-addressed envelope for mail submissions, for notification of the title and author of the winning manuscript, and for the return of your submitted manuscript. There is no reading fee; please do not include a check or cash with your manuscript submission. Reasonable care will be taken, but Arch Street Press cannot be held responsible for manuscripts lost in the mail, or for the return of those unaccompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Please do not send your only copy of the manuscript. All winning submissions become the exclusive property of Arch Street Press.
contract and mentoring program
Details are sent to all finalists.
submission via email or postal mail
Manuscripts may be mailed to:
Arch Street Press • 1122 County Line Road • Bryn Mawr, PA 19010 • USA
Email submissions (preferred) should be sent to Robert Rimm, Managing Editor of Arch Street Press.
We are now accepting submissions for the 2016 Arch Street Prize. Submissions are due by June 1st. The winner will be announced on June 20th.
2015 Winner
Julie Lunde, a recent graduate of Northwestern University, is the 2015 recipient of the Arch Street Prize.
Out of over 150 entries from across the country for the 2015 Arch Street Prize, Julie's submission, "The Plural of Fish," stands out as a remarkably perceptive, poetic and finely structured work consisting of short stanzas in a lyric investigation of unsolvable math theorems, triplets, loneliness and human connection.
Julie double-majored in Creative Nonfiction Writing and Communication Studies. Her prose and poetry have previously been published in The Allegheny Review and Northwestern’s Prompt Magazine. She also served as the founder and director of the Northwestern Jewish Writers’ Workshop, a program that explores the intersection of creative expression and identity.
“What I love most about creative writing is that it is often a lesson in empathy," Julie expresses. "We read and write to escape the boundaries of personal identity and experience, and enter into stories that aren’t our own. The best kind of writing extends and deepens our understanding of the people around us, and helps us connect to them beyond the page. My own writing is fueled by this—the desire to open myself up to other perspectives while finding new ways to articulate my own. I am so grateful to Arch Street Press for giving me the opportunity to share this work with others, and I am honored to be the recipient of this award.”
"The Plural of Fish" is now available as an e-book on Amazon and iTunes.
2015 Finalists
Arch Street Press received entries from undergraduate and graduate students across the United States, with many strong submissions. We're pleased to announce the three finalists:
- Grace Kearney, a junior at Stanford University
- Julie Lunde, a senior at Northwestern University
- Colin Webb, a graduate student at Boston University
To all of the others, we encourage you to keep writing. As part of our mission to promote compelling and strong writing skills, we are happy to provide specific feedback and guidance to all entrants who request this from us.
2014 Winner
Adella Gorgen, a third-year English major and honors student at UCLA, is the 2014 recipient of the Arch Street Prize for an original nonfiction work.
Out of nearly 100 entries from throughout the country for the 2014 prize, Adella's short-story submission, "Miguel and Carmen," stood out as a poignant and evocative account of her childhood spent as a transplant from Tehran living in Los Angeles. She grew up in her family's apartment above an LA pizzeria—a place where she discovered the pains and unanswered questions of life's formative years.
Adella intends to pursue a joint law and English degree. She writes for the UCLA magazine, Fem, and will shortly have her poetry published in Cornell's Rainy Day and UCSC's Matchbox. "I'm grateful for this prize, a major validation of my hard work and writing," responds Adella. "All my pieces have claw marks on them, and this recognition is a smoothing over of some of those marks. Someone once told me that to write well, you have to write about what you know. This is all I know."
"Miguel and Carmen" is available as a single download on Amazon.