Joy of the Pen is opening for submissions very soon—next week in fact! Check out the Application tab at the top of the page to remind yourself about the guidelines!

Here’s our new logo to match the Joy of Art and Joy of the Lens logos. Thank you to Monique for the design!

Hi everyone,

Hope you’re busy writing and getting ready for when we open submissions in September! We thought we’d keep you updated on some Joy of the Pen news.

This year, the Maine-related Nonfiction category will be retired. We’re extremely thankful to Nancy Randolph and Just Write Books for supporting us over the years and we wish them the best of luck in all future projects. Nonfiction writers need not panic, the general nonfiction award, the Richard F. Snow Award, will still open for submissions.

We are also announcing this year a new award! The Crowbait Award will be looking for 10-minute plays, and is sponsored by The Crowbait Club! We’re excited to see what this new chapter brings, and we’re so happy to welcome The Crowbait Club aboard!

A quick reminder that this year’s Joy of the Pen deadline is coming up! Get your submissions in before 4pm on Saturday, October 2!

Joy of the Pen is open for submissions! Click the application link to get started! Help us spread the word by sharing our poster/image!

The Joy of the Pen Literary Journal is now updated for 2020! Congratulations to the winners and a huge thank you to the participants for taking part and our sponsors for supporting us again this year. We’re looking forward to seeing you all at out special reception in the summer!

All of the work is now with the judges for review with a deadline of November 14. We will announce the winners soon after. Thank you to all that entered this year!

After careful consideration and discussion, and a review of online awards, the library has decided that we will postpone the Joy of the Pen reception until the summer. What we envision is an outside celebration, possibly a tea party, that will celebrate the winners of all our joys this year: Joy of Art, Joy of the Lens and Joy of the Pen. Of course, you are all invited! We hope it will give us all something to look forward to throughout the winter months.

It’s nearly time to start submitting to this year’s Joy of the Pen! Submissions open on Saturday, September 5th. All our sponsors have confirmed for another year and we’re adding three new categories this year: Kids fiction, kids poetry and pandemic reflections (all ages).

Joy of the Pen New Poster

You can now read this year’s winners, look at the judges’ bios and see photos from the reception all updated on this site! Also, look out in the next Cryer for a special feature!

The deadline is here. We have all of the submissions in and they’ll be winging their way to the judges by the end of the week!