Writing Contests

Winning opportunities for would-be mystery writers! Check them out.

Each issue features a Mysterious Photograph. Readers are invited to submit a 250-word (or less) flash fiction story based on the photo. The person who invents the best mystery story receives a prize of $25, and the story is published in a future issue and on our web site. See this month’s winner.

AHMM and The Wolfe Pack, the official Nero Wolfe appreciation society, team up each year to sponsor an annual writing contest that seeks to honor an unpublished work of fiction written in the tradition of the Nero Wolfe mystery stories by Rex Stout. Rex Stout was a master of the novella form and published dozens of novellas featuring the corpulent and irascible detective Nero Wolfe and his sidekick Archie Goodwin. Today, the novella is uncommon, though AHMM has a long tradition of publishing novellas. More information on the contest, including submission guidelines, can be found here.