2021 Effie Lee Morris Literary Contest – Date Extended!
We honor and celebrate women authors and diverse writers and hope to include YOU with our 2021 Effie Lee Morris WNBA-SF Literary Contest, launched October 1, 2020 and running through August 1, 2021.
Effie Lee Morris
The Women’s National Book Association San Francisco Chapter is pleased and proud to continue the Effie Lee Morris WNBA Literary Awards in honor of our founder.
Ms. Morris was a pioneering Black librarian and the founder of this chapter of the Women’s National Book Association in 1968. She became the first female chairperson of the Library of Congress and was the president of the National Braille Association for two terms. She was dedicated to literacy for children as well as children in underserved communities, and those who learn differently.
For full information, rules, and to submit your work through August 1, 2021, please go here:
And now, meet the distinguished judges!
Sharifah Hardie is a business consultant, talk show host and influencer. Sharifah was a Long Beach City Council Candidate in the 2020 March 3rd Primary Election and is a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Expert. With over twenty five years of business experience, Sharifah Hardie has positioned herself to become one of the top executives in entertainment, business, politics and a person on the rise. Sharifah is the author of Signs You Might Be An Entrepreneur – How to Discover the Entrepreneur in You
Lyzette Wanzer’s work appears in over twenty-five literary journals. She is a contributor to The Chalk Circle: Intercultural Prizewinning Essays (Wyatt-MacKenzie), The Naked Truth, Essay Daily, and San Francisco University High School Journal. A three-time San Francisco Arts Commission and Center for Cultural Innovation grant recipient, Lyzette serves as Judge for the Soul-making Keats Literary Competition Intercultural Essay category. She is currently helming an anthology entitled Trauma, Tresses, & Truth: Untangling Our Hair Through Personal Narrative.
Sumbul Ali-Karamali, a former corporate attorney with an additional degree in Islamic law, is an award-winning writer and speaker. She grew up in California, answering questions about her religion, which is why her books engagingly introduce readers to Muslim beliefs and practices and include The Muslim Next Door: The Qur’an, the Media, and that Veil Thing and her just-released Demystifying Shariah: What It Is, How It Works, and Why It’s Not Taking Over Our Country.
Pushcart Prize nominee Sheryl J. Bize-Boutte is an Oakland multidisciplinary writer. Her autobiographical and fictional short story collections, along with her lyrical and stunning poetry have been described as “rich in vivid imagery,” “incredible,” and “great contributions to literature.” Her first novel, Betrayal on the Bayou, was published in June 2020. She is also a popular literary reader, presenter, storyteller, curator and emcee for local events.
Fourth-generation native San Franciscan, Kathleen Archambeau, is an award-winning writer and LGBTQ activist. She is author of four nonfiction works, Climbing the Corporate Ladder in High Heels (2006), “Seized,” an essay in The Other Woman (2007), edited by Victoria Zackheim, Pride & Joy (2017), and We Make It Better (2019), with gay dad, Eric Rosswood. Academy Award-winning screenwriter, Dustin Lance Black wrote the Foreword to Pride & Joy and endorsed We Make It Better. Archambeau’s work has been favorably reviewed in global and national literary publications and she has been a featured speaker at national and global Pride literary events. Her book was included as part of the Oakland Museum of California store’s Queer California Exhibit and she is a founding member of the James Hormel LGBT wing of the SF Public Library.
Michael Larsen co-founded Larsen-Pomada Literary Agents in 1972. Over four decades, the agency sold hundreds of books to more than 100 publishers and imprints. The agency has stopped accepting new writers, but Mike loves helping all writers. He gives talks about writing and publishing, and does author coaching. He wrote How to Write a Book Proposal and How to Get a Literary Agent, and co-authored Guerrilla Marketing for Writers. Mike is co-director of the San Francisco Writers Conference and the San Francisco Writing for Change Conference.
Rose Castillo Guilbault is the author of the highly acclaimed memoir Farmworker’s Daughter: Growing Up Mexican In America. Her essays have been published in dozens of textbooks and anthologies. She also wrote the book The Latina’s Guide to Success In the Workplace. Rose was the first Hispanic columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle; her column “Hispanic USA” was honored by a number of journalistic and community organizations. A longtime television journalist, she was awarded an EMMY for her work. Ms. Castillo Guilbault was featured in the award-winning book Latinas and Their Muses. Her community activities include Chair of the Commonwealth Club of California’s board of directors and serving as a judge on the Book Awards Committee for several years.
First Place: Butterfly Girl by Anne Marie O’Brien
Third Place: Someone Else by Harriet Garfinkle 
First Place: Refugees in the Promised Land by Ellie Bozmarova 
Second Place: Seoraksan by Lucille Lang Day
WNBA 2018 Annual Writing Contest
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 (
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 
