Author Stephanie Powell Watts to judge 2020 SC Novel competition

Author Stephanie Powell Watts to judge 2020 SC Novel competition

 

The South Carolina Arts Commission, the College of Charleston Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program, SC State Library, SC Humanities, and Hub City Press announce Stephanie Powell Watts as the judge for the 2020 South Carolina Novel Prize.

 

Stephanie Powell Watts is the author of the novel, No One Is Coming to Save Us, and a short story collection, We Are Taking Only What We Need, which won the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. Her short fiction has been included in two volumes of the Best New Stories from the South anthology and honored with a Pushcart Prize. Born in the foothills of North Carolina, with a PhD from the University of Missouri and a BA from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, she now lives with her husband and son in Pennsylvania where she is an associate professor at Lehigh University.

 

The South Carolina Novel Prize (formerly the First Novel Prize) is open to any South Carolina writer, including those who have never had a novel published and those who have been published. The contest is highly competitive. Applicants’ works are reviewed anonymously by panelists who make their judgments on the basis of artistic merit and narrowed through two rounds of judging. Five novels will be judged in a third round by Watts.

 

The winning author will receive a book contract with Hub City Press, an award-winning independent press in Spartanburg, S.C. The winner is awarded publication by Hub City Press in the form of a printing of no less than 2,000 copies to be nationally distributed to the trade in 2021. This can bring recognition that may open doors to other resources and opportunities in the literary community.

 

Submissions open January 1, 2020 and close March 15, 2020. Find complete eligibility requirements and application guidelines online.