Big Sky, Small Prose - Flash Contest

CutBank Literary Magazine is seeking interesting, compelling prose of 750 words or fewer. Lyric essays, prose poems, short essays, vignettes — send us your best, most dazzling short form prose. 

Guest Judge: Sherrie Flick will judge the 2026 contest. Sherrie is the author of six books, including the short story collection I Have Not Considered Consequences (Autumn House Press, 2025). She is co-editor for the Norton anthology Flash Fiction America and Senior Editor at SmokeLong Quarterly. Her work has been performed at Symphony Space for NPR’s Selected Shorts and has appeared in many journals and anthologies, including Ploughshares, New England Review, Prairie Schooner, and Flash Fiction Forward. An essay from her debut essay collection Homing: Instincts of a Rustbelt Feminist (University of Nebraska Press) was listed as notable in The Best American Essays 2023. Her most recent awards include a Creative Development Grant from The Heinz Endowments and a Writing Pittsburgh fellowship from the Creative Nonfiction Foundation. 

What We're Looking For: Interesting, compelling fiction and nonfiction prose in 750 words or fewer. Lyric essays, prose poems, short essays, vignettes, hybrid work — send us your best, most dazzling short form prose. 

Contest Submission Guidelines:

• Submissions will be accepted through the Submittable submission manager. Print or email submissions will not be considered. Please include a brief cover letter, biography and contact information in the form provided. Please do not include identifying information in the body of your submission.
• Submissions must be previously unpublished.
• Simultaneous submissions are certainly welcome, provided that you withdraw your CutBank submission immediately via Submittable if it is accepted elsewhere.
• Submissions should be double spaced, no more than 750 words.
• Multiple submissions are allowed with separate entry fees. Please include only one 750-word piece or multiple micro pieces totaling no more than 750 words per submission.
• Submission fee of $7 includes consideration for CutBank's $500 flash prose prize and publication in the annual winter/spring issue of CutBank. Two runners-up will be awarded $50 and publication in the winter/spring issue of CutBank. All other submissions will be considered with submissions for the print edition of CutBank literary magazine.