• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

American Short Fiction

Publishing exquisite fiction since 1991.

  • ISSUES
    • CURRENT ISSUE
    • BACK ISSUES
  • FICTION
  • MFA for All
  • EVENTS
    • THE STARS AT NIGHT
    • STORY SESSIONS
    • MORE EVENTS
  • STORE
  • SUBMIT
    • REGULAR SUBMISSIONS
    • THE HALIFAX RANCH PRIZE
    • AMERICAN SHORT(ER) FICTION PRIZE
    • THE INSIDER PRIZE
  • DONATE
  • ABOUT
  • NEWS
  • SUBSCRIBE

Emily Chammah

Read the Winners of the 2022 Insider Prize

by ASF Editors | September 14, 2022

Read the Winners of the 2022 Insider Prize

Lauren Hough may be known for her spar-ready online presence, but in real life she’s pure warmth: years ago, she overheard us talking about the Insider Prize—American Short Fiction’s annual contest for incarcerated writers—at a coffee shop in Austin, and she walked up, and proclaimed, “I want to help!” So we asked her to be the judge. This year’s submissions capture the uncertainty, loss, and despair so many of us have experienced in the past two years. But they also capture self-reflection, … [Read more...] about Read the Winners of the 2022 Insider Prize

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK Tagged With: David Antares, Emily Chammah, Insider Prize, Insider Prize 2022, Lauren Hough, Maurice Chammah, Michael John Wiese

ASF’s Favorite Reads of 2021

by ASF Editors | December 30, 2021

ASF’s Favorite Reads of 2021

Love them or hate them, year-end wrap-ups and best-of lists can help us make sense of our moment in history, and what moment in history has demanded that we search for clarity, meaning, and comfort like 2021? So, instead of offering a list of ASF staffers' favorite books published this year, we asked our editors about the books they read this year that sustained, inspired, moved, or changed them, regardless of when the book was published. What follows, then, is a hodgepodge of literary gems, … [Read more...] about ASF’s Favorite Reads of 2021

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK Tagged With: 2021, 2022, Alexander Lumans, Amanda Faraone, Anna Kavan, Anne Carson, Anne Helen Peterson, ASF Staff, Brandon Taylor, Claire Vaye Watkins, Dantiel Moniz, Emily Chammah, Fowzia Karimi, Hala Alyan, Jen Brown, Kazuo Ishiguro, Louise Erdrich, Maggie Nelson, Maurice Chammah, Melissa Broder, Michelle Raji, Nate Brown, Patricia Ruiz-Rivera, Peter Kispert, Rachel Yoder, Rebecca Markovits, Sanjena Sathian, Shirley Hazzard, Shirley Jackson, Sol X. Wooten, Souvankham Thammavongsa, Stephanie Frazee, Susan Quesal, Thao Votang, Thomas Savage, Uriel Perez, Willie Fitzgerald, Year-end list

Announcing the 2021 Winners of The Insider Prize, Selected by Mitchell S. Jackson

by Emily Chammah & Maurice Chammah | July 28, 2021

Announcing the 2021 Winners of The Insider Prize, Selected by Mitchell S. Jackson

A few weeks ago, we typed the name “Eva Shelton” into the website of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, looking for an address so that we could send her some exciting news: she’d won The Insider Prize for fiction. Sponsored by American Short Fiction and now in its fourth year, the prize highlights work by incarcerated writers in Texas, whether they live in state or federal prisons, local jails, or immigration detention centers. This time around the guest judge was Mitchell S. Jackson—who … [Read more...] about Announcing the 2021 Winners of The Insider Prize, Selected by Mitchell S. Jackson

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK Tagged With: Emily Chammah, essay, Eva Shelton, Fiction, incarcerated writers, Insider Prize, Keith Sanders, Maurice Chammah, Mitchell S. Jackson, Nonfiction, prison, writers

Announcing the 2020 Winners of the Insider Prize

by Maurice Chammah & Emily Chammah | August 10, 2020

Announcing the 2020 Winners of the Insider Prize

For the last three years, American Short Fiction has sponsored a contest for incarcerated writers in Texas. A group of writers at the Connally Unit, in Kenedy, Texas, came up with the name: The Insider Prize. Each year we get dozens of essays and short stories from men and women in prisons and jails across the state, some handwritten and others produced on typewriters. They tell stories about their lives before prison, about the conditions inside, and about the many places their imaginations … [Read more...] about Announcing the 2020 Winners of the Insider Prize

Filed Under: NEWS Tagged With: Deb Olin Unferth, Emily Chammah, Fiction, incarcerated writers, Justin Torres, Maurice Chammah, Nonfiction, prisons, the Insider Prize, the Marshall Project, writing

The 2019 Insider Prize, Memoir Honoree: “Bucknaked Gurney Unit” by Kevin Murphy, Selected by Joyce Carol Oates

by Emily Chammah | August 1, 2019

The 2019 Insider Prize, Memoir Honoree: “Bucknaked Gurney Unit” by Kevin Murphy, Selected by Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates has a long history with prisons—she’s sprinkled them throughout her stories, tweeted about their poor conditions, and edited a collection of stories by incarcerated men and women. At least one of her novels is banned in some facilities. So she was the perfect judge for American Short Fiction’s 2019 Insider Prize, our contest for incarcerated writers. In the memoir category, she selected “Bucknaked Gurney Unit,” by Kevin Murphy, writing that his “memoir of humiliation and the … [Read more...] about The 2019 Insider Prize, Memoir Honoree: “Bucknaked Gurney Unit” by Kevin Murphy, Selected by Joyce Carol Oates

Filed Under: NOTEBOOK Tagged With: Deb Olin Unferth, Emily Chammah, incarcerated writers, Insider Prize, Joyce Carol Oates, Maurice Chammah, Memoir, prison, Texas

Announcing the Winners of the Insider Prize

by Emily Chammah | October 9, 2017

Announcing the Winners of the Insider Prize

Submissions to The Insider Prize—a writing contest for incarcerated writers in Texas, which we held for the first time this year—came to us in envelopes of many sizes. Most had been previously opened, with a red TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS stamp on the inside of the lip of the envelope that had been taped shut after an inspection. Some were composed on a typewriter. Others were handwritten. Like many literary journals, American Short Fiction accepts only electronic submissions. And while … [Read more...] about Announcing the Winners of the Insider Prize

Filed Under: NEWS, NOTEBOOK, NOTEBOOK FEATURE Tagged With: Deb Olin Unferth, Emily Chammah, Fiction, incarcerated writers, Insider Prize, Maurice Chammah, Memoir, Stories

Primary Sidebar

Issue 81

Guest-edited by Fernando A. Flores, featuring new stories by Yvette DeChavez, Julián Delgado Lopera, Carribean Fragoza, Alejandro Heredia, Carmen Maria Machado, Ruben Reyes Jr., and Gerardo Sámano Córdova.

You can preview the issue here.

NEWS

Read the winners of the 2024 Insider Prize

Read the winners of the 2024 Insider Prize

By ASF Editors

“Memories are a nuisance,” Peter wrote to one of our writers after reading his short story, “but nonetheless they seem to make us who we are, as this story confirms.” This year’s submissions told many stories burdened with memory, but just as many stared bravely into the face of hope, satirized the state of politics, speculated on the future of the world, or else built entirely new worlds to inhabit. In short, the stories written on the inside reflected the stories we wrote this year on the outside. Stories of human toil and dreams and everything in between.
 

Sign up now for Send Us to Perfect Places with Kristen Arnett! Classes are $150 and registration closes May 4, 2025.

×

✨ The Stars at Night 2025: Celebrating Joy Williams, Emily Hunt Kivel, Carrie R. Moore, and Leila Green Little. Get your tickets today!✨

×