WINNERS OF WNBA’S THIRD ANNUAL WRITING COMPETITION
San Francisco Chapter Members Who Placed
Vicki DeArmon works as the Events & Marketing Director for Copperfield’s Books in San Francisco’s North Bay, booking authors for events. In the wee hours, she writes. Her passion is reading and writing fiction. Right now she’s working on a collection of short stories, She Let Go Their Hands, depicting families riding the roller coaster of addiction. Her story from this collection entitled “Hydroplaning” placed second in the 2015 Women’s National Book Association annual writing contest for Fiction. And there’s a comic novel brewing called Tilting: The Nearly True Story of a Small Book Publishing Empire that draws from the years she spent running Foghorn Press in San Francisco in the 1990s. This year, she’s been honored to read at Litquake, to attend Lit Camp 2015 and to be chosen as one of a cast of 13 selected to read pieces at this year’s Listen to Your Mother event in San Francisco. Her blog (onemothersedge.com) is a humorous attempt to consolidate three aspects of her being: writing, motherhood, and co-dependence.
Renate Stendhal, Ph.D. is the author of the award-winning photobiography “Gertrude Stein: In Words and Pictures” (Algonquin, 1994). She is a German-born, Paris-educated writer and writing coach in the San Francisco Bay Area. In Paris, she worked as a cultural correspondent and translated works by Gertrude Stein, Adrienne Rich, Susan Griffin, Audre Lorde et al into German. Her multimedia show “In the Beginning…of the End,” toured throughout Europe in the ‘80s and was produced as an award-winning film by the Canadian Film Board. Her essays appeared in many international magazines. Among her publications are “Lesbian Marriage: A Love & Sex Forever Kit” (New Leaf, 2014, www.lesbianloveforever.com), co-authored with her life companion Kim Chernin, and “True Secrets of Lesbian Desire” (North Atlantic, 2003). Her memoir entitled “Kiss me Again. She Did.” placed second in the 2015 Women’s National Book Association annual writing contest for Creative Non-Fiction. Renate also works in private practice as a relationship expert and coach for couples and individuals. Her Gertrude Stein blog “Why Do Something If It Can Be Done” is at http://quotinggertrudestein.com. Her cultural reviews are on http://scene4.com. She blogs for Epochalips Magazine and the Huffington Post.
First Place Winners
Poetry: Diana Whitney “Curiosity”
Fiction: Allison Har-zvi “If You’re Ready”
Creative Non-Fiction/Memoir: Diane Kraynak “Science Project”
Second and Third Place, Honorable Mention
Poetry
Second Place: Sarah Wohlbach “Words [in transit]“
Third Place: M. Detrick ”The Light-Lust of Trees”
Hon. Mention: Tanya Ko Hong ”Comfort Woman”
Fiction
Second Place: Vicki DeArmon ”Hydroplaning”
Third Place: Kathleen Spiivak ”Moths”
Hon. Mention: Kristen MacKenzie “Cold Comfort”
Creative Non-Fiction
Second Place: Renate Stendhal “Kiss me Again. She Did.”
Third Place: Juanita Martin “The Only Child”
Honorable Mention: L. Loomis “Ghost House”
First Place Winners will receive a $250 cash prize and publication in the Bookwoman, the official publication of the Women’s National Book Association, with 11 chapters nationwide. All other winners will be published on the WNBA website.
Thank you for your submissions! Proceeds from the contest help support scholarships for writing conferences and other professional development trainings.
Thank you to the 2015 Writing Competition judges!
Poetry Judge: Ellen Bass, an accomplished author, her most recent book of poetry is Like a Beggar
Fiction Judge: Michelle Hoover teaches writing at Boston University and Grub Street. Her writing has appeared in numerous publications.
Creative Non-Fiction/Memoir Judge: Deirdre Bair, author of several titles, she received a National Book Award for Samuel Beckett: A Biography
The WNBA Annual Writing Competition Chairperson is Joan Gelfand, Poetry Editor for the “J.”, Development Chair of the WNBA and regular blogger for The Huffington Post.
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