This year both First and Second Place were awarded to a single author, Mr. Morgan McDermott from Chicago.

His First Place submission, entitled Clear Coat, earned him $500 and is currently being published in the Bellingham Review.

For Second Place and $100 he submitted Suspension, which is being published in River City Magazine.

Morgan McDermott is a graduate of the University of Iowa and currently teaches creative writing at Adlai E. Stevenson High School. In 2002 his short stories have received the H.E. Francis Award from the Ruth Hindman Foundation, the Nebraska Review Award, the Dogwood Prize, the River City Award, the Tobias Wolff Award, the New Millennium Award, and a Bridport Prize in the U.K. He resides on the North Shore of Chicago with his new bride, Wendy Parks.

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