Big Sky, Small Prose Contest: And the winners are...

Announcing our 2024 Genre Contest Winners:

April 23, 2024

We are excited to announce the winners and finalists of the 2024 CutBank Genre Contests, judged by Christine Byl, Toni Jensen, and Christina Olson. We appreciate every submission we get — thank you for the opportunity to read your work. The winning stories will be published in CutBank 101 this summer.

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Winner, Montana Prize in Nonfiction: “Kansas Tries to Say Goodbye” by Ruby Hansen Murray

Judged by Toni Jensen

Praise for “Kansas Tries to Say Goodbye” from Toni Jensen: “In “Kansas Tries to Say Goodbye,” Ruby Hansen Murray centers Osage language reclamation and community building in its rightful home on the South Plains. This essay shows the importance of language and land while also telling the compelling story of the language teachers, their histories and processes and deep commitment. The essay’s images and language carry the beauty and motion of the place and people with grace and love. It’s a beautiful portrait of connection.”

Ruby Hansen Murray is a columnist for the Osage News and a MacDowell and Hedgebrook fellow. Find her in Cascadia: A Field Guide, Ecotone, Pleiades, Moss, World Literature Today, the Massachusetts Review, The Rumpus, and Colorlines. She’s a citizen of the Osage and Cherokee Nations with West Indian roots living along the Columbia River.

Winner, Montana Prize in Fiction: “Joining the Pack” by E. Klein

Judged by Christine Byl

Praise for “Joining the Pack” from Christine Byl: “I have always been fascinated by the lives of dogs, and believe them to be kin to humans, yet it’s the rare story that can inhabit an animal’s consciousness without raising my hackles. E. Klein’s “Joining the Pack” is a rare story—inventive but unselfconscious, empathetic but not sentimental, and weird in the best possible way. With choices of diction, syntax and rhythm, the story creates its own logic, making for a nimble, imaginative romp that grabs a reader by the scruff and licks our sorrows into belonging.”

E. William Klein is from Ketchikan, Alaska, and worked in the commercial fishing industry there for 8 years. He received his MFA in Fiction from the Helen Zell Writer's program at the University of Michigan in 2016. His writing was awarded Honorable Mention in Bellevue Literary Review's 2024 Goldberg Prize for Fiction and has otherwise appeared in Carve and MQR.

Winner, Patricia Goedicke Prize in Poetry: “Sometimes when I am traveling alone I think of having a drink again in an airport bar” by Caitlin Scarano

Judged by Christina Olson

Praise for “Sometimes when I am traveling alone I think of having a drink again in an airport bar” by Christina Olson: "I love a good narrative poem, and "Sometimes when I am traveling alone I think of having a drink again in an airport bar" isn't a good narrative poem, it's a great one. We're in the airport with our speaker, wrestling with the dilemma to break seven years of sobriety, and then here comes the father, singing and cooing to his rotten liver. The airport is littered with men, their suitcase wheels making noise, and the father, not in the airport but riding on the shoulders of the speaker, and the estranged family, and the limitations of the body. Our speaker weaves all this trauma into a brief, shining story of abuse and heartbreak and--most essentially--survival. Sometimes we sit next to strangers at airport bars to hear stories; sober or not, you don't need to make friends over a $17 Heineken when you have this poem, which is better than any story a businessman connecting through DFW could tell you anyway.”

Caitlin Scarano is a writer based in Bellingham, Washington. Her second full length collection of poems,* The Necessity of Wildfire*, was a finalist for the WA State Book Award. Find her at caitlinscarano.com.

BIG Congratulations to Allie Mariano, winner of this year's Big Sky, Small Prose Flash Contest, for her 1st place piece, "Water."

Here's what our judge, Zach VandeZande, had to say:

What drew me most to "Water" was its sense of wonder in the midst of tragedy. The best fiction offers us a way to make sense of the world, as in it creates for us the real on the story's own terms, and in doing so gives us a reason to hope. "Water," with its images and with its lyrical prose, does this effortlessly, and I'm grateful for the time I got to spend with it. I think you will be too.

Allie Mariano lives in New Orleans. Her writing has appeared in Saw Palm, Day One, and in New Orleans’ Times-Picayune. She is the nonfiction editor for Midway Journal. She is working on a novel, and she’s happy to be here.

Congrats also to our awesome runners up:

"A Posture of Grace" by Kim McCrea

"Holding His Fire" by Daryl Scroggins

Announcing our 2024 Genre Contest Winners:

Winner, Montana Prize in Nonfiction: “Kansas Tries to Say Goodbye” by Ruby Hansen Murray

Judged by Toni Jensen

2024 Nonfiction Contest Finalists:

Winner, Montana Prize in Fiction: “Joining the Pack” by E. Klein

Judged by Christine Byl

2024 Fiction Contest Finalists:

Winner, Patricia Goedicke Prize in Poetry: “Sometimes when I am traveling alone I think of having a drink again in an airport bar” by Caitlin Scarano

Judged by Christina Olson

2024 Patricia Goedicke Contest Runner-Up:

2024 Patricia Goedicke Contest Finalists:

Announcing our 2023-2024 Big Sky, Small Prose Winners:

**All three of these finalists will be published in issue 100 of CutBank, our winter/spring issue. Stay tuned in 2024 for details!**

BIG Congratulations to Allie Mariano, winner of this year's Big Sky, Small Prose Flash Contest, for her 1st place piece, "Water."

Here's what our judge, Zach VandeZande, had to say:

Congrats also to our awesome runners up:

We'll have more info soon, but we couldn't wait to shout out the news!