THE DAVID A. DRAKE MEMORIAL AWARD
Contest Rules
Write and submit a short story of no more than 8,000 words. It must be either science fiction or fantasy, and must feature strong military themes central to the characters and plot.
- No entry fee. But only one submission per person...your best one!
- No reprints (i.e., the story must be unpublished).
- All entries must be original unpublished works in English. Plagiarism, poetry, song lyrics, settings and/or characters from another person’s works will not be considered. Any AI-generated stories will be automatically disqualified.
- E-mail submissions only. Send entries as .RTF attachments to: baenmilitaryaward@baen.com
Please put DRAKE AWARD SUBMISSION in the subject line when sending a contest entry, and DRAKE AWARD QUESTION in the subject line for questions to the contest administrator.
Please include the following in the body of your email:
- the title of the work
- your (the author's) name, address, and telephone number
- an approximate word count
The manuscript should be a Rich Text Format attachment, in standard manuscript format, and should be titled and numbered on every page, but the author's name MUST BE DELETED to facilitate fair judging. Click here for our standard manuscript format guidelines.
Employees of Baen Books and staff of LibertyCon are not eligible.
Previous Grand Prize winners are not eligible. Previous second and third place winners are eligible.
Contest opens for submissions on September 24, 2026 at 12:01am Eastern Time. Entries sent before that date will be deleted unread.
Contest closes for submissions December 10, 2026 at 11:59pm Eastern Time.
Finalists will be announced no later than February 28, 2027.
What We Want to See
Thoughtful works of science fiction or fantasy that consider war and all things martial as human activities, with characters you want to root for, and a military theme that is essential to the story. We refer you to Jim Baen’s editorial instruction to Keith Laumer on his BOLO stories: “I would like to see something that hints at the profound erudition possessed by the author and is driven by a plot imbued with the deepest philosophical insight into the essential tragedy of the human condition as it is and places it in the bathetic contract to what could, in a better world, be our birthright. Something with scope. Something with sentient tanks.”
What We Don’t Want to See
Stories that show all military personnel or actions as evil or bad or stupid, military window dressing on a story that isn’t actually about military themes, anything set in any universe not your own, thinly veiled copies of previous winners or existing works, novel excerpts, gaming adventure transcripts (though LitRPG welcome!), and screenplays.
Judges
Entries will be judged by Baen editorial staff and select special guest judges.
Prizes
The GRAND PRIZE winner will be published as the featured story on the Baen Books main website and paid at industry-standard rates for professional story submittals. The author will also receive a handsome engraved award and a prize package containing $500 of free Baen Books.
SECOND place winner will receive a prize package containing $500 of free Baen Books.
THIRD place winner will receive a prize package containing $300 of free Baen Books.
Winners will be notified no later than May 1, 2027. (Only the winners will be notified.)
The winners will be officially announced during the Baen Traveling Roadshow at LibertyCon, in Chattanooga, Tennessee. (We would prefer the winners attend the convention, but it is not required.)
Submission Checklist
- All identifying information (author's name, address, email) has been removed from the manuscript and manuscript file name.
- Manuscript is a .RTF file and in standard manuscript format with title and page number on every page. Guidelines for manuscript formatting can be found here.
- Author’s name, address, email, and phone number are included in the body of the email.
- Please note all times for submission deadlines are Eastern Time (ET)!