The Fiction Sessions
A READING SERIES
WINTER 2025 THEME: PERIOD FICTION
In partnership with Tennessee Williams Festival & Beanlandia.
Period Piece
Sunday, March 30 • 7 - 9 PM
Beanlandia
This quarter’s Fiction Sessions is an auxiliary event for the 2025 Tennessee Williams Literary Festival. The reading will be free and open to everyone .
Submissions to read your unpublished fiction (theme: period piece) is open until 11:59PM on Saturday, February 22.
A period piece is defined as a modern work of literature that is set in a past time period. Unlike historical fiction, period fiction does not have to take place against the backdrop of a historical event. Any literary piece set on or before 1999 is considered period fiction.
Period Fiction
The Fiction Sessions Submission Rules
This reading series is an opportunity open to all writers, regardless of prior publications, agented or not, published or not, etc. Third Lantern Lit welcomes and encourages submissions from writers of all races, color, religion, gender, gender identity, age, national origin (ancestry), disability, marital status, sexual orientation, and military status.
Submissions will be open for one week, from Sunday, February 16 to Saturday, February 22. Five readers will be chosen at random through a randomized number generator. Each reader will be given a 7-minute reading slot (around 1,000 words).
This is a live, public reading. Please only submit if you will be in town for the event.
Submission to this event does not transfer any Intellectual Property Rights to Third Lantern Lit.
Submission guidelines
Submissions must follow the reading cycle’s chosen theme. This quarter is PERIOD FICTION.
We are only accepting previously unpublished fiction pieces.
The work that is submitted to Third Lantern Lit will be the work the writer will perform on stage. The submission may be a short story or excerpt from a novel. If you are unsure of what cut you would like to read, you may submit the whole piece (short story or novel chapter), but if chosen to read, your final reading selection must be cut to 1000 words max. We can assist in finding you a cut.
AI submissions are strictly prohibited and submissions generated using AI will not be accepted.
All work submitted must be work owned by the author and not plagiarized from the work of others. This is a no tolerance policy. Failure to adhere to this will result in a ban from all Fiction Sessions events.
Stories that contain gratuitous violence, racism, sexism, trans- or homophobia, foul language, etc. will not be considered.
We are not accepting erotica (sex is fine, but nothing NC17 for this particular series) or fanfiction at this time.