MWA Presents: Crime Hits Home with Guest Editor S.J. Rozan (Anthology call)

Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.

— Robert Frost

Everyone comes from someplace. Everyone lives someplace. Everyone feels safe, feels at home, someplace. These three places may all be the same; or maybe not.

If you go anywhere, even Paradise, you will miss your home.

— Malala Yousafzai

Some people have found home and are content there. Some feel trapped and yearn to leave to find home. Some have left home and yearn to go back.

I am not going to die, I’m going home like a shooting star.

— Sojourner Truth

Everyone also has a group they belong to, a tribe that’s theirs. For some this is family; for others, co-workers. Or people of the same skin color. The same religion. The same gender orientation, politics, love of millinery or Minecraft or the Mets.

There’s no place like home.

— Glinda the Good Witch

Safe at home — that feeling you get when you’re in your living room, your team’s stadium, at your family’s Sunday dinner. Your local café, or bar, or church, synagogue, temple, mosque. Walking down the streets of your city, your village.

Home is the place where we’ve been stuck for the last nine months.

— Pretty Much Everyone

But even here, in this safest of places, sometimes

CRIME HITS HOME

What happens then?

Mystery Writers of America invites you to consider this question. You may define home as you see fit. A place, a group, a feeling. The crime can come from without, or within.

Crime Hits Home will be edited by SJ Rozan, author of 17 novels and 75 short stories. SJ has edited two anthologies (Bronx Noir and Dark End of the Street) and won the Edgar, Shamus, Anthony, Barry, Nero, and Macavity, as well as the Japanese Maltese Falcon and the Private Eye Writers of America Life Achievement Award.

Contest Rules

Submissions: Submissions must be blind. As the MWA National Office is still mostly closed, electronic submissions work best. If you submit electronically, we will acknowledge your submission usually with 24 hours or the next business day by replying to your e-mail.

Process: Each story will be assigned a number. The stories will be read by five panelists, who are active status members of MWA and highly regarded short story writers, selected by the Publications Committee. The top choices of the panel will be sent to the editor for inclusion in the anthology. Judging panelists may not submit a story to an anthology s/he is judging.

Stories must be original — not previously published elsewhere. Stories should be no longer than 6,000 words. Individuals may only submit ONE story for consideration. Manuscript guidelines printed below are required.

Deadline: Deadline for submission is January 15, 2021. Manuscripts must be received in our office by that date. Notification: All authors will receive a “thank you for submitting” letter and will also be notified by e-mail as soon as the final selections have been made. An announcement will be made in The Third Degree no later than May, 2021 listing the winning stories.

The Publications Committee and Board of Directors are proud to have S.J. Rozan serve as the editor for this anthology. She has always been an enthusiastic member of MWA and is unstintingly generous with her valuable time and talents. Please do not contact S.J. directly.

If you have questions about this or any of our MWA anthologies, please contact the MWA National Office: mwa@mysterywriters.org.

Send all electronic submissions to: mwa@mysterywriters.org
Send all paper submissions to: Mystery Writers of America 1140 Broadway Rm 1507 New York, NY 10001-7503