'diverse and brilliant'  Fay Weldon
'intelligent and creative'  Time Out
'my favourite women's magazine'  Wendy Cope
'the best I've read on the subject'  Independent
'full of essential information'  Daily Mail
'astute, invigorating and above all an excellent read'  Helen Dunmore

More than just a magazine

We are a vibrant, ambitious and growing organisation, commissioning work by prominent authors as well as talented newcomers. We aim to provide a high-profile platform for new and established voices with every copy of the magazine. Since the magazine was launched in 1999, Mslexia has become the magazine for women writers to submit to.

If you want to take your writing more seriously - or have some serious fun with your creativity - subscribe to Mslexia.

About Sarah Klenbort

Sarah Klenbort was the winner of the second annual Mslexia Women's Short Story Competition this year with 'Love: A Painting'. She grew up in Atlanta, graduated from the University of Glamorgan in Wales in 2000, completed an MFA at Columbia University in Creative Writing in 2006, and received her PhD in Literature from Binghamton University in 2009. Her fiction and non-fiction has appeared in Mslexia, Ninth Letter, and other literary journals. Her short story, 'Welsh Kid', will be published in the next issue of Drunken Boat, an online journal of art and literature. She now lives in Sydney with her husband and daughter.   

Sarah on winning the Mslexia short story competition

"When the phone rang I thought it was somebody coming to book club who was lost, or someone trying to sell me something… When Daneet introduced herself and said she was calling from Mslexia, I couldn't believe it! I thought maybe, just maybe, I won Third Prize. I was shocked when she said I'd won First Prize in the Short Story Competition, and that it was £2,000. (The most I've ever gotten paid for one piece of writing is $225.) I thought, ‘How am I going to keep this secret for an entire month?!?’  

When I hung up the phone, I told my husband, who replied, ‘Are you sure it wasn't a prank call?’ What a faithless man?!! (He's generally very supportive.)

I don't usually enter contests – I've entered about ten in my life. They always seem to me like playing Lotto, which I don't do.  But I guess it happens that sometimes you win! It's such a thrill – thank you, Mslexia!

(I've been told that writers should ration exclamation points, and use at most seven a year. But I can't help but exceed my ration in writing about the sheer excitement of this news!!!)"