Albedo One, Ireland’s premiere magazine of speculative fiction, has launched the International Aeon Award 2008 short fiction contest. The contest is open to submissions of up to 8000 words (no minimum word limit) in any speculative fiction genre, from Horror to Fantasy and Science Fiction or anything in-between or unclassifiable. The judges have very broad tastes in this regard. The grand prize is 1000 euro and publication in Albedo One. Thanks to the success of last year’s Award, they’ve been able to add a second and third place cash prize of 200 and 100 euro respectively for this year. The second and third place stories will also be published in Albedo One.
The contest will run in four rounds from January 1st 2008 to November 30th 2008. Submissions can be made at any time between those two dates, and stories making the shortlist will be announced shortly after the end of each of the rounds, which end on March 31st, June 30th, September 30th and finally November 30th. After the last round, the top six stories from the shortlist will be chosen and passed on to respected science fiction, fantasy and horror author, Ian Watson, who will act as Grand Judge and pick the winner and second and third place stories.
The Aeon Award is all about promoting new writers and writing in the speculative fields, which has long been the goal of Albedo One. The contest is open to writers from all nationalities, though the entries must be written in English. Full details and guidelines for entering the Award can be found on the Albedo One website at: Guidelines. The entry fee for the Award is a paltry €7 (euro) and can be paid easily and securely on the Albedo One site. Email submissions may be made to Aeon Award
