Prior Contest Winners

EDITOR’S NOTE: Reading the Scintillating Starts you submitted was an eye-opening experience. I had trouble knowing whether many of them were memoir or fiction. That didn’t figure into my decision about the winners, but it made me realize that I could honor more people if we had separate contests for fiction and memoir. In 2016

Congratulations to our fourScintillating Starts WinnersFrank Joseph, Susan Keller,Chris Muniz, and Deborah L. Stautonand Honorable Mention Winner, Julie K. Royce Suggestion: Enjoy these stories. Bookmark this page. You may want to come back and reread this collection.     TO DO JUSTICEBy Frank Joseph Image by © Underwood & Underwood/CORBIS      Ever since I’m little

Congratulations to our three Flash Memoir Winners: First Place: Marni Hochman Tied for Second Place: Karen Arbogast & Donna Landi   Honorable Mentions: Alice Brunner Akesha Baron Sue Kesler Suggestion: Enjoy these memoirs. Share them with your friends and writing peers. If you write flash fiction, enter our current contest. Information is on the home

Editor’s Note: The judges score independently. They don’t talk to each other. Why does this matter? If one qualified judge doesn’t like your piece, take heart and resubmit. Another one will. Just keep searching. Of course if you find things to fix in the meantime, do so. On behalf of the judges and me, we

Congratulations toFirst Place Winner, Janet RobinsonSecond Place Winner, Jonathan Werre And Honorable Mention Winners, Shannon Brown You make me glad we held a separate contest for MG, YA, and NA. Five Notes about the Judging: Readers need to care about your protagonist by the end of the first page.  The potential for intense, hypercritical (to

  Congratulations to these Honorable Mention Winners in Flash Fiction and Memoir. Which is which? Write to Lgood67334@comcast.net with a reason why it matters and I’ll probably tell you. Meantime, revel in these worlds. ever Too Late: A 62-Year-Old Goes From Wannabe to Wife (tentative title), which has been picked up by Koehler Press.   Such

Editor’s Note: One of our judges asked if the quality of submissions was much better now than it was two years ago. I told him I think so. There was also more consistency if the judge’s reactions than usual. The judges score independently. They don’t talk to each other. Why does this matter? If one

Editor’s Note: The judges score independently. They don’t talk to each other. Why does this matter? If one qualified judge doesn’t like your piece, take heart and resubmit. Another one will. Just keep searching. Of course if you find things to fix in the meantime, do so. We hope you enjoy these three Flash Travel

  Congratulations toFirst Place Winner, Elena Murphy;        Second Place Winner, Laura Ruth Loomis;and three Honorable Mention Winners,J.D. Blair, Eileen Granfors, and Pamela Kelso Seven Notes about the Judging: Character matters. Conflict matters. A fresh angle matters. Something needs to happen. Something needs to change or be resolved. The quality of the writing and the