2024 Graduate Literature Competition
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Prize in Fiction
Winner: “Dying Business,” Hannah McLeod
Judge’s note: “Dying Business” is a darkly comic story full of miscalculations and misunderstandings about the ways normal flawed people show love for one another. Full of surprising moments and hard-won tenderness, McLeod weaves a highly satisfying narrative.
Runner-up: “Stacey,” Aimee Kling
Judge’s note: In “Stacey,” the reader is treated to a bracing and structurally adventurous story that does quite a lot in a few pages. Rather than aim for salaciousness, this work lends a humanity to the protagonist while maintaining a sure-handed pace.
Finalists:
§ “Going to See a Man About a Dog,” LM. Hudson
§ “Singing like Gravy,” Brian Longacre
§ “The Rabbit,” Johnny Holloway
§ “Tommy Lee’s Legs,” Anna Robertson
Judged by Maurice Carlos Ruffin, author of two novels–American Daughters (2024) and We Cast a Shadow(2019)–and the New York Times Editor’s Choice short story collection The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You (2021).
Prize in Poetry
Winner: “Rising,” Elizabeth Fisher
Judge’s note: The pantoum form serves this poem well, the repetition elevating the thoughtful, almost mantra-like aspects. The poem gives a sense of slowly spiraling upwards, an ascension effectively reverberated in the title.
Runner-up: “A Hollow Tree,” Daniel Acocella
Judges note: This poem has a haunting, fable-like quality that asked me to reread it again and again. Invocative of the oral tradition of poetry/storytelling in a way that is very difficult to capture on the page, but this poem accomplishes that excellently.
Finalists:
§ “Four Words,” Brian Longacre
§ “Commanding the Troops,” Amelia Allman
§ “The Attack of Culicidae,” Faith Brooks
§ “If You Sit Quietly Beside the Creek,” Johnny Holloway
§ “My uterus is attacking me,” Hannah McLeod
Judged by Ariel Francisco, author of All the Places We Love Have Been Left in Ruins (2024), Under Capitalism If Your Head Aches They Just Yank Off Your Head (2022), A Sinking Ship is Still a Ship (2020), and All My Heroes Are Broke (2017).
Prize in Nonfiction
Winner: “Falling: A Lyrical Memoir,” Braulio Fonseca
Judge’s note: This essay is fierce, furious, and confoundingly creative. It reads like a modern Odyssey, a human in search of himself. The words read as if falling through the mind. The details are rendered not just through the language but through the use of style and movement on the page. Every part of this essay was brilliant.
Runner-up: “The House of Eyes,” Morgan Winstead
Judge’s note: This is a sparse and keenly observed essay. There is something in it of “A Rose for Emily.” The story of an outsider, watching a neighbor, never knowing but only guessing and what lies within. The beauty of this essay is in its withholdings, lack of editorializing, and specific details. It’s the story of a commonplace tragedy, gently told. I loved reading it.
Finalists: .
§ “Beside Myself,” Brian Longacre
§ “Everything is Fine,” Hannah McLeod
§ “Fred’s Place,” Johnny Holloway
§ “July 3, 2009,” Merritt Newman-Shaw
Judged by Lyz Lenz, author of the nonfiction books This American Ex Wife (2024), Belabored (2020), and God Land(2021), as well as the newsletter Men Yell At Me, where she explores the intersection of politics and our bodies in red state America.