Last year, I wrote about how I almost won the Writer’s Digest Annual Writing Competition, placing second in the genre short story category. It was a wonderful experience and an incredible confidence-booster, to have a story chosen out of the thousand+ entries, and almost as soon as it was over I began planning for what I would write for the competition the following year. It wasn’t entirely about winning—what I wanted was to meet or exceed my performance from last year, and…I more-or-less did that!

In the Writer’s Digest 90^th Annual Writing Competition, I had two stories win in the genre category—awarded second place (for the second year in a row!) and tenth place. The second place story, Zarparan, is an unconventional crime story featuring the UK’s National Food Crime Unit. The tenth place story, Eternal Return, is high-concept horror about art and Plato. I’m very honored to have my writing chosen again—I’m not sure in the 90 years of the contest they’ve had someone place second for two years running—and am in the process of seeking publication for both stories.

The full list of winners in their respective categories can be found here, as well as printed in the November/December issue of Writer’s Digest Magazine. More information about the WD Annual Competition can be found here. I love Writer’s Digest as a resource for writers of all kinds—fiction, nonfiction, for every audience and genre—and am looking forward to participating again in 2022! Who knows what will happen next year.

Writer’s Digest has given me electronic badges for each story won, and even though they look the same, I will post them both!