FANDANGO VIRTUAL'S 2005 FICTION CONTEST

1st Prize ($500)
The Grand Parade by Richard Madelin

2nd Prize ($200)
In My Broken Chair by Tanya Laramie

3rd Prize ($100)
Blooms by Kathy Fish

Honorable Mention (in no particular order)

Mooncup by Viv Craske

Getting Cathy into Clothes by Michael Garner

Queen of the Stars by Nell Grey

and

BONUS PRIZES

Additional bonus prizes will be awarded through random drawings.
Every entrant has a chance to win these special gifts, including a seat in
To Write Well's online course, Impact of Style, valued at $499.

Fandango Virtual is pleased to host its third annual fiction contest. This year we are opening the contest to the combined readership of Fandango Virtual's two quarterly publications, Gator Springs Gazette and Bonfire. We are accepting short stories of 1000 to 5000 words, but we won't quibble about a few words more or less. Works must be previously unpublished in any print or online venue and may be in any genre as long as they have a literary quality. Copyright to the work must be held by the contest entrant. No sim-subs allowed. Entries will be accepted from now until midnight (GMT) on 30 November 2005 and the winners will be announced on New Year's day 2006. Winning entries will be published in the May-June-July edition of Gator Springs Gazette in 2006. Authors of other entries which meet Fandango's acceptance standards may be invited to publish in future issues of the Gazette or Bonfire.

The reading fee of $10, payable through the PayPal button (below), entitles the entrant to submit one story. You may enter as often as wish, but must pay $10 for each separate entry. Acknowledgement of payment will be made to the email address of the PayPal account used to pay the fee. We regret that no other method of payment will be allowed.

All funds collected will be applied first to administration of the contest, then toward production costs of Gator Springs Gazette and Bonfire.

CONTEST ENTRY INSTRUCTIONS:

Once you have paid the reading fee, you will be contacted with instructions for your entry. You should then reply to the specially coded e-mail address (set up specifically for the contest) following the given instructions. Any entries which do not follow these instructions will NOT be considered.

All entry attachments will be separated from the e-mail by a very patient assistant and passed on to a panel of volunteer judges. After a blind reading by the panel of judges, a shortlist will be selected. The short-listed entries will be read by our final judge, Susan O'Neill, who will select the winners. Her decision will be final.

Bonus gifts donated by generous Fandango Virtual supporters will be awarded through random drawings of the entrants' names and will not be related to the assessment of the works. Your name will be entered in the drawing each time you pay for a separate entry.

The Fandango Virtual 2005 Fiction Contest is open to all writers in the English language except for members of the Fandango staff and volunteer judges and their families.

About our judge:

Susan O'Neill is the author of Don't Mean Nothing: Short Stories of Viet Nam (Ballantine 2001/Black Swan [UK]
2002/UMass Press 2004). First published
in hardcover in 2001, this excellent collection is a fictional account of her experiences as a nurse in Viet Nam.

From the LA Times:

"Offers startling glimpses of absurdity and transcendence at three Vietnam field hospitals where, against a background of blood and testosterone, young female officers and nurses are made simultaneously into saviors, survivors, and sex objects. . . . as entertaining as it is harrowing."

Susan is the co-editor of the online flash journal, Vestal Review. Her work has appeared in Boston Magazine, Adventure Cyclist, Chattahoochee Review, LitPot, Ink Pot, Exquisite Corpse, In Posse Review and Gator Springs Gazette. One of her GSG stories received a Pushcart nomination in 2004.

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