About The Winners

Meet The Winners of The Shine Journal's First Annual, "Let's See Your Shorts" contest:   

SOPHIE BACHARD, our $100.00 first place winner, lives in South London, UK. According to Sophie, she was raised as a feral child by stray dogs on a council housing estate. Recent and forthcoming  works appear in Underground Voices, Forgotten Worlds, Cover of Darkness,Ballista, Rose & Thorn, Poetic Diversity, The Written Word, Shalla Magazine and others. Her website is : http://bachard.wordpress.com

Editor's Note: In The Blind Man, Sophie presents us with an intriguing story that speaks to need, the cruelty that can exist in relationships and anger bubbling just below the surface. It asks whether familiarity really does breed contempt...  

Second Place and winner of $50.00 MAYA ITA is from an undisclosed location (space?). She says she doesn't have very many writing accomplishments to cite, so it's particularly terrific that her story came in second place. She does spend a lot of time writing, reading, drawing, theatre-ing (whatever that means), watching foreign movies and running around aimlessly while her friends watch her in total exasperation. She hopes you will hear more of her at some point, preferably not in a tabloid. 

Editor's Note: MAYA's story is called Dividing Line. It  brings us to the very edge - that precipice, if you will, which we all must face. It offers a perspective on what happens as one man's hourglass of life trickles down...  

CHERYL WILLIAMS,our third place winner, lives in Charlotte, NC with her husband and three children.  She has been writing since the age of 15 and has been published in various journals and magazines.  Cheryl is currently working on her first novel, which is a novel written for teenage girls.  She enjoys ( of course) writing, music, and walking her dog, Bugsy.  She collects $25.00 for her entry. 

Editor's Note: Cheryl's story, Longing to Remember, reflects that each of us longs for something in our lives. Countless of us long to simply know what our lives have meant, the depth of who we truly are and what happens when even this is lost to us forever... 

Honorable Mention goes to ELINA ZISMANOVA for her story titled Failure. Born on Sakhalin Island in the Far East of Russia, Elina Zismanova says she grew up in northern Russia beyond the Arctic Circle.  She moved to the US in 1980 and now lives in Highland Park, NJ  with her husband and four daughters. 

Editor's Note: Elina gives us a clever little story which talks about something many of us face as we grow older...and suggests, in at least one case, an interesting solution.  

To read these remarkable stories and to support the authors, visit  http://theshinejournal.com with my thanks!

Best,

Pamela