The Audacious Book Club Essay Contest Winners
And details about the next contest, for fiction, horror, oh my!
At the end of Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s Bite by Bite, she offered a series of writing prompts and when we invited you to write an essay inspired by one of those prompts, more than a hundred of you accepted the challenge. There were so many wonderful essays about your experiences with food, family, friends, how you define home, and much more. It was challenging to winnow the submissions into a list of fifteen finalists and even more difficult to pick a winner. Aimee, herself, read those finalists’ essays and picked a winner and three runners up (who will each receive $250). Congratulations to everyone who participated and especially the winner and runners up. The winning essay will be published toward the end of November, so keep an eye out.
WINNER
Instant Pot Time Machine by Taj Zaidi
RUNNERS UP
Daring to Love a Durian Fruit by Felicia Chang
Junk Food by Caroline Diggins
Tomato by Laura Khoudari
FINALISTS
Queen of the Casseroles by Marcelle Beaulieu
Coming for the Chopping by Amy Chadwick
Cooking My Father Back to Life by Caroline Hagood
The Kitchen With Two Doors by Kristina Kasparian
Quenelle de Brochet by Jessica Palmer
Parsley by Susannah Pratt
Shelf Life of Milk and Oranges by Parlei Riviere
Calabacitas by Liza Sparks
Anything But Cooking, Please by Sonora Taylor
Congee is My Security Blanket by Hui Tran
Growing Up by Iris (Yi Youn) Kim
Our Bite by Bite inspired writing contest was so fun and you guys wrote so many wonderful essays that we’re going to do it again. This time, the category is… Horror. One of my favorite things about Gretchen Felker-Martin’s Cuckoo was the way she wrote a horror story that felt utterly original and reminded us that the ways our society treats people on the margins is far greater a horror than any dark imagining of the monsters beneath our beds.
We will be accepting entries for your best horror stories (fiction only) from now until October 15th at midnight. Stories must be no longer than 3,500 words. The winner will receive $2,500, publication in The Audacity, and a one-hour Zoom session where I offer feedback on up to 25 pages (double-spaced) of your fiction or non-fiction prose. Winners will be announced by December 2nd.
The submission link is below.