Short Fiction Competition

Many thanks to all who entered the 2020 Short Fiction Competition. We appreciate the opportunity to read such bright and brilliant new work. From more than 2,200 submissions, guest judge Téa Obreht has announced results.

Spring 2021 Edition

The editors are thrilled to announce the release of the Spring 2021 Edition, designed by the acclaimed artist Jeffrey Gibson, with contributions from Pulitzer Prize-winner Steven Millhauser, PEN/Hemingway Award-winner Tommy Orange, and 2020 Zoetrope: All-Story Short Fiction Competition-winner Deborah Forbes, among others.

Five Questions with Jeffrey Gibson

Why did you accept the invitation to design the Spring 2021 edition of All-Story?
It was an opportunity that I’ve not had previously, and I’m working on a book project for which I’ll be the editor. So I’ve been paying a lot of attention to print material lately, and I thought this would be a perfect chance to have some fun with the format of a publication. 

Summer of Ladders
Steven Millhauser

Then came the summer of ladders. I don’t mean that the presence of ladders is in any way surprising, in our New England town. Every March or April, as soon as the last snow melts from the last strip of lawn, the first ladders appear. We see them leaning against the sides of houses, harbingers of spring as reliable as the unfolding petals of dogwood and forsythia. As the weather grows warmer the ladders begin to multiply, as if nourished by the sun. Stepladders spread open beside high hedges and backyard fences. All summer long you can find us standing above our well-mown lawns, touching up our shingles and window frames, cleaning out our rain gutters. By summer’s end the ladders have begun to grow scarcer, though you can still see them in a scattering of yards. Deep into autumn a few remain, disappearing at last with the coming of the first snow.

But that summer you could feel a difference. At first it was only the familia . . .