BLR seeks high-caliber, unpublished* work, broadly and creatively related to our themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.

FICTION GUIDELINES:

We seek character-driven fiction with original voices and strong settings. We do not publish genre fiction (romance, sci-fi, horror). We have only occasionally published flash fiction. While we are always interested in creative explorations in style, we do lean toward classic short stories.

• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• Manuscripts can only be accepted electronically via Submittable. If you are experiencing technical difficulties, please reach out to info@blreview.org.
• 5,000 word maximum (though most of stories are 2,000-4,000 words)
• There is a $5 fee per general submission, which is waived for current subscribers. (If you are not a current subscriber, you can subscribe when you submit your work and take advantage of free submission.) These fees help BLR fund publication of the journal, but please contact us at info@blreview.org if you are experiencing financial hardship.
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript.
• Authors receive $150 upon publication. Authors will also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional one-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies.
• All submissions must be of previously unpublished work.* BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.

(*For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere–and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance–we will remove it from consideration.)

BLR seeks high-caliber, unpublished* work, broadly and creatively related to our themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.
 

CREATIVE NONFICTION GUIDELINES:

We are looking for essays that reach beyond the standard ‘illness narrative’ to develop a topic in an engaging and original manner. Incorporate anecdotes that feel  alive, and dazzle us with thoughtful and creative analysis that allows  these anecdotes to serve a larger purpose. (Please note that we do not publish graphic narratives, academic discourses, or works with footnotes.) 

• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• Manuscripts can only be accepted electronically via Submittable. If you are experiencing technical difficulties, please reach out to info@blreview.org. 
• 5,000 word maximum (though most of stories are 2,000-4,000 words)
• There is a $5 fee per general submission, which is waived for current subscribers. (If you are not a current subscriber, you can subscribe when you submit your work and take advantage of free submission.) These fees help BLR fund publication of the journal, but please contact us at info@blreview.org if you are experiencing financial hardship.
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript.
• Authors receive $150 upon publication. Authors will also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional one-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies.
• All submissions must be of previously unpublished work.* BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.
   

(*For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere–and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance–we will remove it from consideration.)

BLR seeks high-caliber, unpublished work, broadly and creatively related to our  themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.
 

POETRY GUIDELINES:

We encourage poems that are accessible to a wide audience. Characteristics we look for are vivid writing, strong narrative, and rendering the familiar new. We encourage you to peruse back issues in our archive to get a sense of our ethos. 

• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• Manuscripts can only be accepted electronically via Submittable. If you are experiencing technical difficulties, please reach out to info@blreview.org. 
• Please include no more than three poems per submission. Each poem should be on a separate page within a single document.
• There is a $5 fee per general submission, which is waived for current subscribers. (If you are not a current subscriber, you can subscribe when you submit your work and take advantage of free submission.) These fees help BLR fund publication of the journal, but please contact us at info@blreview.org if you are experiencing financial hardship.
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript.
• Authors receive $75 upon publication. Authors will also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional one-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies.
• All submissions must be of previously unpublished work.* BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.

(*For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere–and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance–we will remove it from consideration.)
 

The annual BLR Prizes award outstanding writing related to themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.

 

2026 Goldenberg Prize for Fiction
Judged by Joan Silber
 

Joan Silber is the author of ten books of fiction. The most recent is Mercy, out in September 2025. Secrets of Happiness was a NY Times Editors’ Choice and a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. Improvement won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award. She also received the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story. Fools was longlisted for the National Book Award and a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. She lives in New York and taught for many years at Sarah Lawrence College and in the Warren Wilson College MFA Program.

GUIDELINES:   
 

• Deadline: July 1, 2025
• First prize is $1,000 (in each genre) and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR.  Honorable mention winners will receive $300 and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR.
• Fiction: Bellevue Literary Review seeks character-driven fiction with  original voices and strong settings. We do not publish genre fiction (romance, sci-fi, horror).  Our word max is 5,000, though most of our published stories tend to be in the range of 2,000-4,000 words. We have only occasionally published flash fiction.  While we are always interested in creative explorations in style, we do lean toward classic short stories.  
• Do not put your name or other identifying information on the manuscript document (or in the filename). Manuscripts are read blindly by reviewers, editors, and judges.
• Work previously published in print or electronically will not be considered. For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or  published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on  personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis.  We ask that authors be honest about web postings. (If a work is  discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere—and not openly  acknowledged by the author in advance—we will remove it from  consideration.
• Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but we ask that you notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere. We regret that there can be no refunds or substitutions for withdrawn work.
• All contest entries will also be considered for regular publication.
• Students/friends/colleagues/relations of a judge are not permitted to enter submissions to that judge's genre.
• BLR acquires first-time North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies. After publication, all other rights revert  to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made. 
• Contest winners are usually announced in November. Decisions for the rest of Issue 50 (to be published in spring 2026) will be made by the end of the year.
   

We encourage you to read BLR before you submit. Samples from each issue are available on our website.

 We're happy to offer a 50% subscription discount to all authors who participate in the contest. (If you live outside the US, you must select the International option. Otherwise, we'll be unable to ship the journal to you. Thanks!)

 

The BLR Prizes award outstanding writing related to themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.

2026 Felice Buckvar Prize for Nonfiction
Judged by Nicole Chung 

Nicole Chung is the author of A Living Remedy, named a Notable Book of 2023 by the New York Times and a Best Book of the Year by over a dozen other outlets. Her 2018 debut All You Can Ever Know was a national bestseller and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Chung has written for The New York Times Magazine, The Guardian, Time, Esquire, The Atlantic, and many other publications.

GUIDELINES:
 

• Deadline: July 1, 2025
• First prize is $1,000 (in each genre) and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR. Honorable mention winners will receive $300 and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR.
• Creative Nonfiction: We are looking for essays  that reach beyond the standard ‘illness narrative’ to develop a topic  in an engaging and original manner. Incorporate anecdotes that feel  alive, and dazzle us with thoughtful and creative analysis that allows  these anecdotes to serve a larger purpose. Please note that we do not publish graphic narratives, academic discourses, or works with footnotes. (5,000 words maximum)
• Do not put your name or other identifying information on the manuscript document (or in the filename). Manuscripts are read blindly by reviewers, editors, and judges. 
• Work previously published in print or electronically will not be considered. For BLR,  “published work” means published in print in North America, or  published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic  websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on  personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis.  We ask that authors be honest about web postings. (If a work is  discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere—and not openly  acknowledged by the author in advance—we will remove it from  consideration.)
• Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but we ask that you notify  us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.  We regret that there can be no refunds or substitutions for withdrawn work.
• All contest entries will also be considered for regular publication.
• Students/friends/colleagues/relations of a judge are not permitted to enter submissions to that judge's genre.
• BLR acquires first-time North American rights, and the right  to reprint in anthologies.  After publication, all other rights revert  to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate  acknowledgement to BLR is made. 
• Contest winners are usually announced in November. Decisions for the rest of Issue 50 (to be published in spring 2026) will be made by the end of the year.
   

We encourage you to read BLR before you submit.  Sample writing is available on our website.

We're happy to offer a 50% subscription discount to all authors who participate in the contest. (If you live outside the US, you must select the International option. Otherwise, we'll be unable to ship the journal to you. Thanks!)

The BLR Prizes award outstanding writing related to themes of health, healing, illness, the mind, and the body.

2026 John & Eileen Allman Prize for Poetry

Judged by Patricia Spears Jones
 

Patricia Spears Jones is an African American poet, playwright, and cultural activist who is the current New York State Poet and a Poet Laureate Fellow. She is author of The Beloved Community and A Lucent Fire: New and Selected Poems, and nine other poetry publications and plays. She has taught at Barnard College, Hunter College, Adelphi University, and Hollins University as well as for independent literary organizations including Poets House and The Poetry Project at St. Marks Church. She is an Emeritus Fellow for the Black Earth Institute and organizer of the American Poets Congress. 

GUIDELINES

• Deadline: July 1, 2025
• First prize is $1,000 (in each genre) and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR.  Honorable mention winners will receive $300 and publication in the Spring 2026 issue of BLR.
• Poetry: We encourage poems that are accessible to a wide audience. Characteristics we look for are vivid writing, strong narrative, and rendering the familiar new. We encourage you to peruse back issues in our archive to get a sense of our ethos.  You may submit up to three poems per submission (include all three in one file).
• Do not put your name or other identifying information on the manuscript document (or in the filename). Manuscripts are read blindly by reviewers, editors, and judges.
• Work previously published in print or electronically will not be considered. For BLR,  “published work” means published in print in North America, or  published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic  websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on  personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis.  We ask that authors be honest about web postings. (If a work is  discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere—and not openly  acknowledged by the author in advance—we will remove it from  consideration.)
• Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but we ask that you notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.  We regret that there can be no refunds or substitutions for withdrawn work.
• All contest entries will also be considered for regular publication.
• Students/friends/colleagues/relations of a judge are not permitted to enter submissions to that judge's genre.
• BLR acquires first-time North American rights, and the right  to reprint in anthologies.  After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.
• Contest winners are usually announced in November. Decisions for the rest of Issue 50 (to be published in spring 2026) will be made by the end of the year.

 We encourage you to read BLR before you submit.  Sample writing is available on our website.

We're happy to offer a 50% subscription discount to all authors who participate in the contest. (If you live outside the US, you must select the International option. Otherwise, we'll be unable to ship the journal to you. Thanks!)

Subscribing to the journal is a tangible—and very much appreciated—way of supporting the BLR. The $25 fee is our regular one-year subscription price, so the submission is free with your subscription order.  (If you live outside the United States, you must select the option that includes international shipping in order to receive print copies. Otherwise we will process your order as a digital subscription. Thank you for understanding.)
 

Please also feel free to use this category if you are a subscriber who would like to renew your subscription while making a submission. 

Please note: Only general submissions can be made through this category. Contest entries must be submitted under the appropriate contest category when the BLR Prizes are open for submission.

Fiction:
Bellevue Literary Review seeks character-driven fiction with  original voices and strong settings. We do not publish genre fiction (romance, sci-fi,  horror) and have only occasionally published flash fiction. While we are always interested in creative explorations in style, we do lean toward classic short stories.
 

Creative Nonfiction:
We are looking for essays that reach beyond the standard ‘illness narrative’ to develop a topic  in an engaging and original manner. Incorporate anecdotes that feel alive, and dazzle us with thoughtful and creative analysis that allows  these anecdotes to serve a larger purpose. Please note that we do not publish graphic narratives, academic discourses, or works with footnotes.

Poetry:
We encourage poems that are accessible to a wide audience. Characteristics we look for are vivid writing, strong narrative, and rendering the familiar new. We encourage you to peruse back issues in our archive to get a sense of our ethos.
 

We encourage you to read BLR before you submit. Please check out our online archive.

 

GUIDELINES

• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• Manuscripts can only be accepted electronically via Submittable.
• Fiction/nonfiction word max is 5,000 words, though most of our published prose is in the range of 2,000-4,000 words.
• Include no more than three poems per submission. Each poem should be on a separate page within a single document.
• There is a $5 fee per general submission but it’s waived for current subscribers. (If you are not a current subscriber, you can subscribe when you submit your work and take advantage of free submission.) These fees help BLR fund publication of the journal, please contact us at info@blreview.org if you're experiencing financial hardship.
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript.
• Authors receive $75 for poetry and $150 for prose upon publication. Authors also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional 1-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies.
• All submissions must be of previously unpublished work.* BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.
   

(*For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere–and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance–we will remove it from consideration.)

 

Give yourself the gift of literature ~ subscribe to the BLR today!

The Bellevue Literary Review is a special community of readers and writers, and we value each person who joins us.
As you think about meaningful gifts for friends and family, consider a unique and remarkably affordable gift for the thoughtful and curious person in your life: a subscription to the Bellevue Literary Review.

NOTE: New subscriptions will begin with Issue 47, out this fall!  


(If you live outside the United States, you must select the option that includes international shipping. Otherwise we can't mail it to you. Thank you for understanding.)

We recognize that subscribing to the journal is a tangible—and very much appreciated—way of supporting the BLR, thus the submission fee is waived for current subscribers.

This portal is for subscribers only. Manuscripts accidentally uploaded here by non-subscribers will not be reviewed.

• If you are unsure of your subscription status, or if you subscribe under a different name, please send us an email at info@blreview.org and we'll get  back to you ASAP. 
• If you are not a BLR subscriber, please submit under the General Submissions category, or use the Subscribe + Submit category.  
• We are happy to consider fee waivers in order to make submitting accessible to writers. Please reach out to info@blreview.org to inquire about a fee waiver (or reduced-fee contest entry when the BLR Prizes are open).

Please do not have more than two active submissions at a time. Please note that only general or theme issue submissions can be made through this category. Contest entries (when open) must be submitted under the appropriate contest category.

 

GUIDELINES

Fiction:
Bellevue Literary Review seeks character-driven fiction with  original voices and strong settings. We do not publish genre fiction (romance, sci-fi, horror). Most of our published stories tend to be in the range of 2,000-4,000 words. We have only occasionally published flash fiction.  While we are always interested in creative explorations in style, we do  lean toward classic short stories. (5,000 words max.)

Creative Nonfiction:
We are looking for essays that reach beyond the standard ‘illness narrative’ to develop a topic in an engaging and original manner. Incorporate anecdotes that feel  alive, and dazzle us with thoughtful and creative analysis that allows  these anecdotes to serve a larger purpose. Please note that we do not publish graphic narratives, academic discourses, or works with footnotes. (5,000 words max.)

Poetry:
We encourage poems that are accessible to a wide audience. Characteristics we look for are vivid writing, strong narrative, and rendering the familiar new. We encourage you to peruse back issues in our archive to get a sense of our ethos. Please submit no more than three poems. Each poem should be on a separate page within a single document.
 

• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• Manuscripts can only be accepted electronically via Submittable.
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript.
•  Authors receive $75 for poetry and $150 for prose upon publication. Authors also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional 1-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies.
• All submissions must be of previously unpublished work.* BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.
   

(*For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere–and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance–we will remove it from consideration.)