Submissions Promo:  Submit by end of day on 2/2, and we'll respond to your submission within 2 weeks (no extra charge for expedited response).
 

"Finally, to hinder the description of illness in literature, there is the poverty of the language. English, which can express the thoughts of Hamlet and the tragedy of Lear, has no words for the shiver and the headache. It has all grown one way. The merest schoolgirl, when she falls in love, has Shakespeare or Keats to speak her mind for her; but let a sufferer try to describe a pain in his head to a doctor and language at once runs dry. There is nothing ready made for him. He is forced to coin words himself, and, taking his pain in one hand, and a lump of pure sound in the other (as perhaps the people of Babel did in the beginning), so to crush them together that a brand-new word in the end drops out. Probably it will be something laughable."
 

 -from On Being Ill by Virginia Woolf

The editors of West Trade Review seek creative nonfiction that engages with the ideas of mental health and mental well-being. Specifically, we'd like to read personal stories that are raw, honest, and vulnerable in their explorations of mental health or mental well-being and their intersection with inequality, access to healthcare, the need for accessible, quality mental health care, and/or the need for open conversations about mental health and practices that contribute to mental well-being.
 

                    Writers are encouraged to speak their truth, to share their challenges, losses, and triumphs. Simply creatively explore these ideas and the potential themes below to give voice to a truth that is often difficult to verbalize, as Woolf so eloquently expresses.
 

We are excited to read your work and share your stories with others.
 

Potential themes are (but not limited to):

• ​the challenges of living with a mentally ill adult children
• understanding and navigating neurodivergencies
• navigating and healing from traumatic experiences
• addiction
• chronic disease
• anxiety or depression
• the intersection of homelessness and mental illness
• grief and loss
• the importance of self-care for mental well-being

NOTE: Submissions which do not meet the following guidelines will not be considered:
Guidelines:
 

Guidelines:
 

- Submit one CNF piece of up to 6,000 words. Please submit a double-spaced Microsoft Word file.

 - Include a clear title of the work.

  -Include a cover letter and a short 3rd person biography of no more than 150 words. Work submitted without a biography will not be considered.

  -If your work is a simultaneous submission, please let us know immediately if it is published elsewhere.
 

  -Writers may not submit more than once per reading period
 

Entries that do no meet guidelines or eligibility requirements will not be considered.

 

Selected  work will be included in an anthology published by Iron Oak Editions.  Publication will include an honorarium.  A portion of all book sales  will be donated to NAMI.  
 

 While we offer free submissions the first week of each month (April to December), general submissions are typically $3 (to cover administrative costs).  

You may also choose to receive a quick decision about your work for $10, and may also receive a quick decision about your work along with personalized feedback from the editors for $25 (1.5-2 pages).   The response time for both expedited and personalized options is approximately 2 weeks. 

Please take a moment to follow us on social media and subscribe to our newsletter. 

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The West Trade Review Prize for Poetry

Submissions Promo:  Submit by end of day on 2/2, and we'll respond to your submission within 2 weeks (no extra charge for expedited response).

 
The contest is open from January 15, 2024 - March 15, 2024. Entry fee is  $15 for each entry (three poems per entry), with no entry limit per writer, and includes a copy of our spring 2024 print edition.
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Eligibility


 

• This contest is open only to emerging writers only who have not yet published a book with a print run over 1,500.
• Only previously unpublished poems will be accepted.
• Poems that have won and/or placed in any other writing contest are ineligible. 
• Unlimited entries allowed. Three poems per submission. 
• Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but work previously accepted or published in West Trade Review is ineligible.
• Please withdraw your submission and notify West Trade Review if it is accepted elsewhere.
• No one editorially or financially affiliated with West Trade Review can enter the contest.

​
Guidelines
 

• One  submission per entry fee of $15 (up to three poems per submission).   Entry fee includes a copy of our Spring 2024 print edition. 
• Poet may submit up to three poems. Author is allowed multiple entries.
• The author’s name must not appear on the manuscript or in the file name.
• Please submit up to three poems per entry in a single Microsoft Word file and  list the title of each poem as the submission title in Submittable.
• Please use a standard font, either Times New Roman or Arial in 12-point font size.
• Must include a title for each poem.
• Please do not include professional resumes or biographies with your entry.  Entries are judged anonymously; the judge will only consider poem  quality.
• Revisions or edits will not be accepted once submitted for judging. 

​Entries that do no meet guidelines or eligibility requirements will not be considered.
 

$1000 and publication in West Trade Review will  be awarded to the winning poem.  Other entries of merit may be  considered for publication. The winning poem will be announced on our  website and social media platforms mid-April 2024 and then published in the 2025 spring print issue of West Trade Review.
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 This year's contest judge is Rick Barot.

Rick Barot was born in the Philippines and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. His fourth book of poems, The Galleons, was published by Milkweed Editions and was longlisted for the National Book Award. His earlier collections include The Darker Fall, Want, which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award and won the 2009 Grub Street Book Prize, and Chord,  all published by Sarabande Books. Chord received the UNT Rilke Prize,  the PEN Open Book Award, and the Publishing Triangle’s Thom Gunn Award.  His work has appeared in numerous publications, including Poetry, The New Republic, Tin House, The Kenyon Review, and The New Yorker.  He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the  National Endowment for the Arts, and Stanford University. He lives in  Tacoma, Washington and directs The Rainier Writing Workshop, the  low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Pacific Lutheran  University. His newest book of poems, Moving the Bones, was published by Milkweed Editions in 2024.  

The Phyllis Grant Zellmer Prize for Fiction

Submissions Promo:  Submit by end of day on 2/2, and we'll respond to your submission within 2 weeks (no extra charge for expedited response).

The contest is open from January 15, 2025 - March 15, 2025. Entry fee is  $15 for each individual story (one story per entry), with no limit per writer, and includes a copy of our spring 2024 print edition.
              ​
​

Eligibility

• This contest is open only to emerging writers only who have not yet published a book with a print run over 1,500.
• Only previously unpublished stories will be accepted.
• Stories that have won and/or placed in any other writing contest are ineligible.
• Unlimited entries allowed. One story per submission.
• Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but previously accepted or work published in West Trade Review is ineligible.
• Please withdraw your submission and notify West Trade Review if it is accepted elsewhere.
• No one editorially or financially affiliated with West Trade Review can enter the contest.

​
              ​​
Guidelines
 

• All entries must be submitted by 11:59pm EST on March 15, 2025. Submissions open January 15, 2025.
• Entry fee is $15 for each individual story (one story per entry), with no  limit per author, and includes a copy of our spring 2024 print edition.
• ​Submission is one original story up to 5,000 words.
• ​The author’s name must not appear on the manuscript or in the file name.
• ​Please submit one story per entry in a single Microsoft Word file and list the title of your story as the submission title.
• ​Please use a standard font, either Times New Roman or Arial in 12 point font size.
• ​Do not include a cover page. Include your title with your story.
• ​Please do not include professional resumes or biographies with your entry.  Entries are judged anonymously; the judge will only consider story quality.
• ​Please take the judge of the contest into consideration. If you know her personally, or have ever attended classes or workshops she has instructed, please use manuscripts that she would not have seen before.
• ​Revisions or edits will not be accepted once submitted for judging.

​
   ​Entries that do no meet guidelines or eligibility requirements will not be considered.
              ​
   $1000 and publication in West Trade Review will  be awarded to the winning story.  Other entries of merit may be  considered for publication. The winning story will be announced on our website and social media platforms mid-April 2025 and then published in the 2026 spring print issue of West Trade Review.


Contest Judge:  Lucy Ives

Lucy Ives is the author ofLife Is Everywhere: A Novel and, most recently, An Image of My Name Enters America: Essays, both published by Graywolf Press. Her writing has appeared in Aperture, Artforum, Harper's, The Paris Review, and Vogue. She teaches at Brown University.