F(r)iction Contests

Short Story Judge
$1,000 Prize

Manuel Aragon

Manuel Aragon is a Latine writer, director, and filmmaker from Denver, CO. He is currently working on a short story collection, Norteñas. Norteñas is a collection of speculative fiction short stories centered in the Northside, a Mexican and Mexican- American centered part of Denver, and the people, ghosts, and demons that live there.

His work has appeared in ANMLY and Barrelhouse. His short story, “A Violent Noise,” was nominated for the 2020 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. He is a 2021 Periplus Collective Fellow, a 2021 NYFA IAP Mentor, and a 2023 Tin House Residency winner. He is also a Colorado Book Award finalist as editor of the anthology, All The Lives We Ever Lived: Vol 2. 

He is a graduate of NYU’s Maurice Kanbar Institute of Film and Television. His film work – writing and directing – has been featured on MTV, Pitchfork, and Stereogum. He most recently won the CineLatino Pitch Latino Award for Emerging Filmmakers with his web series, Welcome to the Northside, a comedic take on gentrification and Latino displacement in North Denver. 

Website: manuelaragon.com
Instagram: @spacejunc

Poetry Judge
$300 Prize

Trish Broome

Trish Broome is a half-Korean writer and poet who grew up in Newport News, Virginia. She received her BA from Longwood College and her MA from Loyola University Maryland. Her poetry is featured in You Might Need to Hear This, Half and One, Cure Today, Yellow Arrow AMPLIFY Vignette, SLAM! Performance Poetry from the Underrepresented and Novus Literary Arts Journal. She is also a featured author in the book A Letter to My Mother, which explores the relationship between mothers and their children. Much of her writing explores her mixed-race identity, grief, mental health and addiction. She performed her spoken word poem at the Baltimore Book Festival in 2024 and was a western regional judge for the 2025 Poetry Out Loud competition. You can check out her writings at trishbroome.com.

Instagram: @trishb.poetry

Creative Nonfiction Judge
$500 Prize

Shannon Chen See

Shannon Chen See (she/her) is a writer born and based in Kingston, Jamaica whose work explores Caribbean situatedness through questions of place, identity, and belonging. Her work has appeared in sx salon, Burnaway, theVERSEverse, among others. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Writing (Poetry) at Pacific University, and is a recipient of the Kwame Dawes Mapmakers, Washburn, and Merit scholarships. Building creative community across digital and physical geographies is also central to her practice. She is the Managing Editor of PREE, a digital-first platform amplifying vital voices from the Caribbean and Elsewhere, as well as an Executive Member of the Journal of Jamaican Art, an art writing collective documenting and critically engaging with Jamaican art. Shannon is also an alum of The New Art School Modality’s “Arts Writing / Writing About Art” course. She regularly performs her poetry, and has been a featured poet for readings at the University of the West Indies and the Poetry Society of Jamaica.

Instagram: @watchensee
Twitter: @watchensee
Website: https://www.watchensee.xyz

Flash Fiction Judge
$300 Prize

Brett Pribble

Brett Pribble is the Director of the Writing Residency at the Kerouac House in Orlando, FL. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from such places as Gone Lawn, Maudlin House, Saw Palm, The Molotov Cocktail, decomP, Five on the Fifth, and Aquifer: The Florida Review Online. He is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Ghost Parachute, and he’s the editor of the anthology Ghost Parachute: 105 Flash Fiction Stories. 

Instagram: @brettpribble
Facebook: Brett Pribble
Twitter: @brettpribble
Bluesky: @brettpribble.bsky.social