Announcing the Winners, Shortlist, and Longlist of The Letter Review Prize for Short Stories, Flash Fiction, and Poetry (May – June 2023)
We’re uncontainably excited to share these nine winning entries with you, along with our Shortlists and Longlists. It gives us a bubbly / effervescent feeling to read astonishing pieces which have never seen the light of day.
Our deepest thanks and commendations go out to every entrant to this round of our Prizes. As ever, the care invested in each piece shines through. There are never any frivolous entries, and this alone makes choosing winning pieces complex and challenging. We hope that by providing Shortlists, and Longlists we can help to bring warranted attention to some writers beyond the Winners category. As you already know, if you missed out in this round we hope that you do not feel discouraged.
This time, the Judges decided to award three equal winners in each round. It was simply too hard to place these wonderful pieces of writing into a hierarchy. Having three equal winners also allows The Letter Review to celebrate differing styles of fiction and poetry, without privileging one variety above another. For this reason, in the future we will award three equal winners in all of our contests.
The Letter Review’s aim has always been to provide opportunities for as wide a variety of writers as possible. In service of this, we have expanded the categories of the subsequent rounds of our prizes to include Short Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Unpublished Books, and Art. The September – October round of our Prizes is now open, which you can enter below.
Without further ado, we can’t wait for you to read those chosen as the Winners. Make sure to click the title of each piece to read the winning entry. We hope you enjoy, and we hope to hear from you soon.
Winning Entries
Short Story Winners
- Ivan Suazo – How To Run a Bodega Successfully in the Boogie Down, NYC
- Janna Wagner – In Search of Omega
- Ruth MacLean – Monday Morning Rain or Shine
Flash Fiction Winners
Poetry Winners
- Blake Auden – Nam Mater Mea
- Dion O’Reilly – Dark Matter
- Frank William Finney – Here Stood the Thespians’ Tavern
Shortlists
Short Story Shortlist
- Mallory Miles – The Polar Bear
- Indyana Horobin – Sharky Stevens
- Emily Brown – Trouble Child
- Anil Classen – Fish Need to Swim
- Katcha Vidoyevich – Daddy
Flash Fiction Shortlist
- Sal Ragen – Sadie
- Genevieve Flintham – Even Herons Need To Eat
- Charlene Cason – Going Away
- Charles Grosel – Mom-G
- Carl L. Williams – What Mattered More
- Gideon McDonald – on the Mother
Poetry Shortlist
- Veronica Ma – strings and boxes
- Cindy Ellen Hill – Liberty NY 1977
- Stephanie Powell – Luteal waiting
- Heather Blakey – Silverhand
- Gary Beaumier – Portrait of My Soul as a Mushroom
- John Peter Beck – Kick the Can
- Charles Grosel – In Sleep and Waking
- Torrey Francis Malek – The Irish Walrus
- Michael Shoemaker – The Cost of a Human Life
- Linn Berkvens – Money
Longlists
Short Story Longlist
- Christy O’Callaghan – Stars
- Miki Lentin – The Party
- David Osgood – The Smell of Old Books
- James Skivington – The Portrait
- Robin Lovelace – Rougarou
- Chris Cody – What Day is it?
- Roberts Jekabsons – Down Goes Walcott
- Luke Lewin Davies – Holloway Road
- Holly Woodward – Breaking Silence
Flash Fiction Longlist
- June O’Sullivan – The Boathouse
- Pam Swanborough – A Hand-shy Heart
- Nancy Quinn – PLEASE. SIT.
- Alex Kupisiewicz – Stardust
- Will Burnette – The Fisherman
- Sydney Bollinger – Post Mortem
- Amber Fenik – Bus Fare
- Paul Watkins – The Tablet
Poetry Longlist
- Alex Stanley – The Saguaro Child
- John Osburn – Passage
- Daniel Moreschi – A Sunset Spectacle
- Ashley Davis – White Fingerprints
- Dana Kinsey – My Friend’s Reflection after Bad Tinder Date #38
- Wendell Hawken – Hayfield Elegy on the Road to Long Branch
- Stephen Allen – The Naturalist
- Alicia Sometimes – Robes of Darkest Blue
- Christie Washam – Watermelon Naengmyun
- Paul Buchheit – Old Man
- Elizabeth Hill – The Hamptons