ANNOUNCING THE WINNERS OF THE
12TH ANNUAL PALO ALTO WEEKLY 1997
Adult Winners
Put up your feet and enjoy! As our contribution to your holiday relaxation, we are pleased to bring you the adult prize winners in the Weekly's 12th annual Short Story Contest.
The three winning stories will take you along with a boy preparing for his first day at an elite high school, a woman painting in the mountains and a little girl and her mother cooking in the kitchen of a Southern plantation.
These stories were selected from 96 entries in the adult category. Next Wednesday, we will publish the first-prize winners in the three youth categories.
The adult winners will receive cash prizes of $500 for first place, $300 for second and $200 for third. They were also honored at a reception Dec. 2 at the Weekly.
Selecting the best stories was not an easy task. Editorial department staff members spent hours reading the stories before passing 10 finalists to the panel of judges, who selected the top three.
The adult winners were chosen by a distinguished panel of judges who are local writers and teachers of writing: Pam Gullard, Tom Parker and Linda Gray Sexton.
During the entire judging process, the names were removed from all stories so that neither the editorial staff nor the judges knew the identities of the winners until after judging was complete.
Judges looked for characteristics such as an original voice, emotional impact, perception of the situation and precision in the language used.
Thank you to those who entered--we enjoyed reading your stories. The competition was tough, so don't feel discouraged if you didn't win. Keep writing, and try again next year in the Weekly's 13th annual Short Story Contest. First Place
Phil Taylor, Junkanoo
Constance Crawford, Don't bother the nice lady
Lalita Tademy, The cooking lesson
Young Writers Winners
It is our pleasure to bring you the youth prize winners in the Palo Alto Weekly's 12th annual Short Story Contest. The winning adult entries were published last week.
The youth winners were chosen by a distinguished panel of judges. The 6- to 9-year-old and 10- to 13-year-old divisions were judged by three local people with a longtime interest in children's books: Los Altos children's book author Shirley Climo, Palo Alto Children's Librarian Katy Obringer and Los Altos children's book author Bruce Balan. The young adult (14- to 17-year-old) winners were chosen by judges who are local writers and teachers of writing: Pamela Gullard, Tom Parker and Linda Gray Sexton.
The 107 entries in the youth divisions were screened by the editorial staff of the Weekly, which passed along semifinalists to the judges. Youth winners will receive gift certificates of $100 for first place, $75 for second and $50 for third, from sponsoring independent bookstores Kepler's (14- to 17-year-old category), Printers Inc. (10- to 13-year-old category) and Linden Tree Children's Records and Books (6- to 9-year-old category).
We would like to thank all who entered the 12th annual Palo Alto Weekly Short Story Contest. We enjoyed reading your stories and encourage you to enter the 13th annual contest next year.
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