(a Press 53 Publication)
Welcome to Issue 199 of Prime Number Magazine, our largest issue of the year! In this issue you’ll find the winners and runners-up of the 2021 Prime Number Magazine Awards for Poetry & Short Fiction; winners of the free “Prime 53 Poem” Summer Challenge; winners of the PNM Flash Fiction Prize; winners of our free, monthly 53-Word Story Contest; selections from guest poetry editor Terri Kirby Erickson and guest short fiction editor Dennis McFadden; introductions for our guest editors for Issue 223, April-June 2022; and our second offering of the Press 53 Spotlight.
We hope you enjoy every word of this issue and that you will share our link with your friends. To see all of this, scroll down and click on the images or the light blue links to get started on your reading journey. Your escape has arrived!
But first, a quick message
Now Open for Entries! We’re looking for an outstanding, unpublished collection of stories!
$1,000 Advance
Publication
50 Copies
Get information on how to enter
2021 Prime Number Magazine Awards for Poetry & Short Fiction
SHORT FICTION JUDGED BY
Dennis McFadden
Short Fiction First Prize($1,000)
“Black Cat” by Jacqueline Parker
RUNNERS-UP
Short Fiction: “While Her Guitar Gently Weeps” by Jim Roberts
Short Fiction:
“Gorilla Language” by Lisa Allen Ortiz
Poetry: “Coupled” by Heather McClelland
2021 PNM Flash Fiction Prize
Low $11 entry fee (a prime number)
Judged by the Press 53/Prime Number Magazine editorial team
First Prize ($251)
”Hidden Places” by Jaime Greenberg
Second Prize ($151)
”The Fading” by Noah Evan Wilson
Third Prize ($53)
”The Breakup” by Melissa Rosato
53-Word Story Contest
A free, monthly writing competition. Join our email list to get your prompt on the first day of each month.
Write a 53-word story about (prompt)
Then send your story by the fifteenth (15th) day to 53wordstory@gmail.com
July (a train): “The Buzz about the Wedding” by Greg Hill
August (ripening): “Ship Seeking Ship” by Hayley Igarashi
September (an order): “Equine Knocks” by Sandra Burley
“Prime 53 Poem” Summer Challenge
Each summer, from July 1-August 30, we invite writers to send us a “Prime 53 Poem,” a specific form that contains exactly 53 syllables, and we publish our four favorite Prime 53 Poems for our readers to enjoy.
Editors' Selections
Each issue, we ask our guest editors to select their favorite poems or stories from those submitted during our open submission period (first two months of each quarter). Submissions are free and only accepted through Submittable. Here are the guest editors and their selections for Issue 199, October-December 2021.
Guest Editor for Poetry
Terri Kirby Erickson
Terri Kirby Erickson is the author of six full-length collections of poetry, including A Sun Inside My Chest (Press 53), winner of the 2021 International Book Award for Poetry. Her work has appeared in “American Life in Poetry,” Annals of Internal Medicine, Asheville Poetry Review, Atlanta Review, Healing the Divide: Poems of Kindness & Connection, How to Love the World: Poems of Gratitude and Hope, JAMA, Latin American Literary Review, Poet’s Market, Quarterly Literary Review Singapore (QLRS), San Pedro River Review, storySouth, The Christian Century, The Poetry Foundation, The Sixty-Four: Best Poets of 2019, The Sun, The Writer’s Almanac, 3rd Wednesday, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Verse Daily, and many more. Her awards include the Joy Harjo Poetry Prize, Atlanta Review International Publication Award, Gold Medal for Poetry in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards, Nazim Hikmet Poetry Award, Nautilus Silver Book Award, and numerous others. She lives in North Carolina.
Terri’s Selections
Guest Editor for Short Fiction
Dennis McFadden
Dennis McFadden grew up in Brookville, a small town in western Pennsylvania very much like the fictional Hartsgrove in his book Jimtown Road, winner of the 2017 Press 53 Award for Short Fiction. A graduate of Allegheny College and a retired project manager for the state of New York, he lives and writes in a cedar-shingled cottage called Summerhill in the woods of upstate New York. His stories have appeared in dozens of publications, including The Missouri Review, New England Review, The Sewanee Review, Crazyhorse, The Antioch Review, Prairie Fire, The Massachusetts Review, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and The Best American Mystery Stories. His first short story collection, Hart’s Grove, was published by Colgate University Press in 2010. In 2018 he was awarded a Fellowship at the MacDowell Colony.
Dennis’s Selections
Press 53 Spotlight
In each issue of Prime Number Magazine we showcase four authors from our publisher, Press 53. Our intent is to introduce our readers to more great writing, and to help our publisher find more readers for these writers and their books. Enjoy!
Meet Our Guest Editors for Issue 223,
April-June 2022
(Submissions are open now through November 30 at Submittable)
Adrian Rice
Guest Editor for Poetry
Dennis McFadden
Guest Editor for Short Fiction
Get to know our guest editors!
Read a poem from Adrian and a story from Dennis, and then read their bios.
prime number
: any integer other than 0 or ± 1 that is not divisible without remainder by any other integers except ± 1 and ± the integer itself (Merriam-Webster's Dictionary)
In literature: poetry and prose that is distinctive and unique (Prime Number Magazine)
Prime Number Magazine is a Press 53 publication, founded by Clifford Garstang and Kevin Morgan Watson on July 17, 2010, beginning with Issue 2, and following with all issues in prime numbers