The Perkoff Prize is a tri-genre contest that awards $1000 and publication each to writers of the best story, set of poems, and essay that engage in evocative ways with health and medicine as judged by the editors. The competition is open to everyone except students and faculty at the University of Missouri, United States.

The competition is organized by The Missouri Review, a literary magazine published at the University of Missouri.

All submissions must engage with health and medicine in some way.

• Poetry: up to 10 pages of poetry.
• Fiction: up to 8500 words.
• Nonfiction: up to 8500 words.

All submissions must be previously unpublished.

Each entrant receives a one-year subscription to the Missouri Review in digital format

We are keen to encourage quality, so suggest writers to check their stories before submitting using Prowritingaid. They have free and paid versions and are the best writing software we know to help improve grammar, readability and check for repetition, ‘sticky’ sentences and suggest alternatives.

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