The Fourth Annual Adelaide Literary Award Contest 2020 ended, and the results were announced on January 31.

As many of you already know,  there are several well-developed and tested methods in judging literary contests submissions, that help us apply numerical values to often abstract criteria for evaluation of literary excellence. By giving numerical values from 1 to 10 or more to author´s creativity, premise or idea behind the written work, presentation (spelling, punctuation, grammar, and usage), structure, style and tone, theme, characters & dialogue, or in the case of poetry to additional elements like poetic devices,  rhyme and/or rhythm, comprehension and coherence, word selection, and universality of the message, we arrange judged literary works in accordance to accumulated points (to a maximum of 100) and those with the highest number of points are winners.

In the case of our literary competition in three categories – best poem, best short story, and best essay, after two rounds of readings, we ended up with the final 65 poems, 82 short stories, and 50 essays, each with the number of points of 90 and over. So much for having an easy job of choosing the winner.

We congratulate to all Winners, Shortlist Winner Nominees, and Finalists on their achievement.

Adelaide Literary Award Anthology 2020 will be released on February 27 with works of all 188 Finalists  in four volumes with over 1600 pages in total of brilliant writings  (Poetry, Essays, Short Stories I, and Short Stories II).

You can order your copy of the Anthology at our online store. https://adelaidebooks.org/collections/anthologies

 If ordering more than three copies, please send your order to  orders@adelaidebooks.org with the number of copies you desire and we will issue you a discount code to use at the check-out.

Many thanks to all participants in our Literary Contest and for the support of the Adelaide Literary Magazine and Adelaide Literary Award 2020.

The following is the list of the Winners, Shortlist Winner Nominees, and Finalists in all three categories:

 

SHORT STORIES   

The Winner:

THE OPTIMIST by Joram Piatigorsky

Shortlist Winner Nominees:

APPALACHIAN CURSES by Brooke Reynolds 

SWEAT by Jonathan Maniscalco

GRANDPA by Douglas Walrath

STRUGGLE BUS by Steven Lebow

RUN, DON’T WALK by Monika R. Martyn

MOLDING by Jessamyn Violet

THE DAY OF THE JAGUAR by W. Royce Adams

A MOMENT IN TIME by Taylor Boughnou

A SECRET FOR UNCLE TEDDY by Edith Tarbescu

CELEBRATION by Magdalena Blazevic

HUNTER’S CABIN by Donny Barilla

 

Finalists:

Melody Sinclair

Viswanath Gurram

Steven Markusen

Robert Kelsoe

Brandy McKay

Leandro Almeida

Bil Johnson

Laura Dunn

Joanna Kadish

Tom Carter

M.F. Robinson

Michael Warren

Read Trammel                            

Kipp Van Camp

Roger McKnight

Julian Darragjati

Christopher Johnson

John Riebow

Robert Gamer

Ted Morrissey

Ron Singer

Ross Goldstein

Lao-Tzu Allan-Blitz

Gregory St. Thomasino

Donna Lee Miele

Jack Coey

Martin Golan

Andrea Lorenzo

Phoenix DeSimone

Wayne Hall

Blake Rose

Parker Sterni

David Macpherson

Aaron Israel

Darrell Case

Edward Hunt

Paul Perilli

Tara Marta

Christine Hand

David Rich

Fleury Sommers

Robert Perron

Dan Carpenter

Ernesto Gomez

Maria Tsirona

Holley Hyler

Tony Whedon

Richard Rose

Erma Odrach

Bonita LeFlore

Ciaran McLarnon

Giusi Rotondo

Mehreen Ahmed

Boris Kokotov

John Weil

Gerald Winter

Jim Zinaman

Mark Massaro

Ray Tatten

Adelaide B. Shaw

George Held

Leah Holbrook Sackett

Heather Whited

Brian Feller

A.I. Fabler

Susan Pollet

Mike Cohen

 

ESSAYS  

 

The Winner:

SINGING OUT LOUD by Ronda Beaman

 

Shortlist Winner Nominees:

DEEP DIVE by Susan Bloch

LEFT BEHIND by Kim Akhtar

HOW TO MARRY THE PERFECT MAN by Beth Mead

THE PORTRAIT OF A YELLOW BUTTERFLY by Marianne Song

A MURKY FUTURE by Jennifer Nelson

CHILDHOOD, INTERRUPTED by Aysel K. Basci

MORAL ARCHEOLOGY by Jeff Loeb

WHITEBOARDS AND COURAGE by Beth Burgmeyer

FOOLISH MORTAL Kevin Drzakowski

MY PLACE UNDER THE SUN by Jahnavi Misra

THE CORONA FRIENDSHIP TRILOGY by Sara Gelbard

 

Finalists:

Terry Engel

Ellen Birrell

Daniel Bailey

Mary Daurio

Deborah Paes de Barros

Jason James

Rafiki Chemari

Steven McBrearty

Megan Madramootoo

Wally Swist

Lisa Lebduska

Stephen Moore

Susan M. Davis

Steve Sherwood

John Bonanni

Pam Munter

Edward Reilly

Daniel Ruefman

Allen Long

Janel Brubaker

Sara Wetmore

Linda Murphy Marshall

Donald Secreast

Patrick Hahn

Broome Cole

 

 

POETRY  

 

The Winner:

THE HARE by Lowell Jaeger

 

Shortlist Winner Nominees:

ANTHEM by Catherine Rohsner 

SEMI by James Croal Jackson

PLAGUE 2020 by Andre DeCuir

NOT A COOKIE-CUTTER GREEK GODDESS by Jan Little

A BIRD ABOVE NEW YORK CITY by David Dephy

A POEM FOR A PALESTINIAN POET by Lali Tsipi Michaeli

CLOCKWORK ON AVOCADO STREET by Anahit Petrosyan

WHEN I LIVED ON ARCH STREET by Monique German

CONRAD HILTON by Richard Weaver

WING by Melissa Chappell

HOMESCAPE by Nathanael O'Reilly

 

Finalists:

Donny Barilla

Terry Scott Boykie

S.J. Stephens

Sonali Chaprana

Helen Hagemann

Deji Ayoade

Daniel Cureton

Joseph Reilly

Kathryn Merriam

Mohamed Mahou

Martin Altman

Aracelly Campo

Alex Hand

Peter Freeman

Carol Lynn Grellas

Laura Foley

Jeton Kelmendi

Valerie Angel

Frederick Pollack

Craig Kennedy

Zia Marshall

Bob Kirkley

Anannya Uberoi

Sophie Chen

Roseangelina Baptista

Abby Ripley

George Gad Economou

William Welch

Kimberly Crocker

Ernest DeZolt

PC Scheponik

Megha Sood

Taylor Boughnou

Leslie Howard

Clara Leo

José Recio

Chani Zwibel

Lazaro Perez

RC deWinter

Robert Knox

Ambrose Gibbs

Ann Christine Tabaka

BellaBianca Lynn

Korkut Onaran

Lazar Sarna

Andrea Cladis Hodge

Timothy Robbins

Rebekah Coxwell

Edward Bonner

Louis Gallo

Daniel King