CONNECT with the City2024 Short Story Contest
Join us! Live Readings & Awards Event
It's time to celebrate our finalists, the talented and creative writers who have won this year's Short Story Contest! Please join us to learn the identities of our finalists and enjoy a delightful evening of live readings of the top three winning stories, performed by Write Out Loud, and sponsored by the Friends of San Diego Central Library. Q&A with the authors will follow. The Short Story Contest shines a spotlight on local writers and is a continuation of the Library’s robust support for local writing. Register here to secure your spot!
2024 Winners
Walt Besecker spent most of his adult life working in a variety of senior public service positions in the Washington, DC area before moving with his wife, Susan, to San Diego in 2019. He has long dreamed of writing and only recently began to make that dream a reality.
Barbara Javor, Ph.D., is a marine biologist who weaves science, natural history, and animals into her writing. She conceives stories during walks and bike rides which she calls “bicycle writing.” The COVID-19 quarantine period inspired the rewriting of lyrics of favorite old tunes and publishing Marine Biology Songs—Pier Reviewed!
Carlos Tarrac, a California-based educator with a Master’s in Education, is an accomplished author, translator, and illustrator. His works encompass narrative and poetry for both children and adults, gaining acclaim at events like the Book Festival of Paris, the Purple and Royal Dragonfly Awards, and the International Latino Book Awards.
Amber Forbes moved from Australia to the USA and became an actual alien. Her writing explores concepts of society and humanity, and is full of aliens, spaceships, and questionable choices. She is currently writing the final novel in her series, The Rhaslok Chronicles, when not being distracted by her four cats.
Clare Rolens is an English Professor at Palomar College. You can find her writing in Vestal Review, Bright Flash Literary Review, and Toasted Cheese Literary Journal, among others. She serves as a poetry editor for the journal One Sentence Poems, and can currently be found reading a detective story.
Lawrence Philip is a novelist, prose writer, and poet living in the greater San Diego Area. His work has been published in The Story Starts Here, volume 2, and the San Diego Poetry Annual. He is seeking publication for his novel Becoming Captain Hook.
Lucy Zhang writes, codes, and watches anime. Her work has appeared in The Massachusetts Review, Wigleaf, Apex Magazine, and elsewhere. She is the author of the chapbooks HOLLOWED (Thirty West Publishing) and ABSORPTION (Harbor Review).
Patricia Watts worked as a journalist for more than 20 years in Texas, Hawaii, and Alaska, then for 10 years investigated human rights cases for the State of Alaska. Paper Targets is the most recent of her five published novels. She has a son, daughter, and seven grandchildren.
A former Google software engineer turned watercolor artist, Sara weaves her creativity through words and colors. Her short story "Hippity-hop" earned her 3rd prize in the SDPL Short Story Contest 2022 and her literary works find a home in the pages of Helikopter, Aloka, and Lunaris Review magazines.
ShuJen Walker Askew writes short stories, poems, scripts, and plays in various genres. Her works can be viewed in college and San Diego anthologies. She is working on her first novel and pursuing an English degree. ShuJen is an electrical engineer by trade, mother of two, and enjoys writing.
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Previous Winners
A.K. McCutcheon began crafting tales of magical realism to entertain her younger siblings. She set storytelling aside for an office administration career in radio broadcasting, magazine publishing, and theater management. Following her recent retirement, her passion for writing reignited with membership in writer’s communities online, where she advocates fiercely for Oxford commas. A.K. and her husband Dan enjoy movies, travel, and browsing used bookstores.
Tammie Rue Elliott always dreamed of writing. She has published one novel, short stories in literary magazines, and is a repeat contributor to the Chicken Soup series. She currently resides in San Diego, where she is working on completing the myriad of half-finished novels which reside on her computer.
Janice L. Newman is the author of the acclaimed science fiction and fantasy romance collection “At First Contact” and, under the name Laura Weyr, the Rainbow Award-winning fantasy romance, “The Eighth Key.” She has contributed to both volumes of “Rediscovery: Science Fiction by Women,” and is currently working on more thrilling science fiction and fantasy romances.
ShuJen Walker Askew writes short stories, poems, scripts, and plays in various genres. Her works can be viewed in college and professional San Diego anthologies. She is currently working on her first novel, Across All Skies. ShuJen is an Electrical Engineer by trade, mother of two, and enjoys writing.
Susan Gembrowski Baker is a member of the Dramatists Guild and of Around the Block Playwrights. The group showcases its work in staged readings at San Diego venues. She is a board member of San Diego Writers Ink and her short stories have been published in “A Year in Ink.”
Anna Glynne started writing short stories in 2020. Her story, "The Sea is a Deceitful Thing," was published by the San Diego Decameron Project. When she's not writing at her kitchen table in La Jolla, Anna enjoys hiking on the trails in Idyllwild with her husband and two college-aged daughters.
Regina Morin’s first published poem appeared in a 1954 high school anthology. Since then she has written articles, plays and one musical. Her poems have appeared in several volumes of “A Year in Ink” and the “San Diego Poetry Annual.” “Name Your Poison” is her most recent foray into fiction.
John R. Morris, a native Californian, enjoys surfing, skiing, and traveling. He’s been writing since the 1980s and is a longstanding member of the Spring Valley Writers Group. His debut novel, “The King's Steel,” was released in 2022. John’s currently working on his second novel entitled “Planet in a Box.”
Deb Nordlie has taught English since dinosaurs ruled the earth. After a lifetime of writing assignment sheets, she’s branched into writing life stories, believing “we are all anthologies filled with short stories and poems.” Occasionally though, she pens uncharacteristic oddball lit. A teacher of writing in adult school, she still continues to scribble away at the Great American Novel. You can view her work in the Chestnut Review, San Diego Poetry Annual, Coffee + Crumbs, Reminisce, Crown City Magazine, the San Diego Reader, and the Scapegoat Review.
Nick E. K. Tran is a San Diego native who graduated at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in marketing. He helps market beer during the day and writes at night. He likes to write short stories, poetry, and is currently writing his first novel.
David J. Schmidt is an author, podcaster, multilingual translator, and homebrewer who splits his time between Mexico City and San Diego, California.
Schmidt has published a variety of books, short stories, and articles in both English and Spanish, including Three Nights in the Clown Motel, a book of “non-fiction horror,” as well as the series Gone Viral: Urban Legends of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Schmidt is the co-host of the podcast To Russia with Love. He speaks twelve languages and has been to 33 countries. He received his B.A. in psychology from Point Loma Nazarene University.
Website: www.holyghoststories.com
Sara Wilczyńska was born and raised in Warsaw, Poland. She graduated in computer science and works as a software engineer at Google. After living in Barcelona, Edinburgh, London, Zurich and New York, she settled in San Diego. She teaches yoga and meditation and is a sound healing practitioner. She explores sticking words together into sentences, and presently flirts with short forms. Her work was published in Helikopter literary magazine.
Translator’s bio:
Kate Webster is a Polish-to-English literary translator living in London, UK. She has translated short stories and essays by Joanna Rudniańska, Marta Kisiel and Agnieszka Graff, among others. Examples of her work can be found on the websites of Przekrój, Switch on Paper and Eurozine. Her translation of Barbara Sadurska's novel The Map is due to be published in 2021.
For questions or further clarification regarding the rules and guidelines, please contact us at: sroman@sandiego.gov.