Wisconsin People & Ideas Fiction and Poetry Contest Reading

media release: Wisconsin People & Ideas, the Wisconsin Academy’s magazine of contemporary Wisconsin thought and culture, presents a Wisconsin Book Festival reading featuring the winners of the statewide 2023 Fiction & Poetry Contests. We will be joined by Nicholas Gulig, the state poet laureate of Wisconsin and the first place winner of the 2022 Wisconsin People & Ideas contest in poetry. 

2023 Fiction and Poetry Contest Winners   

Fiction readers: 

1st Place story by Matt Cashion, La Crosse  “Music Appreciation for the Dead”  

2nd Place story by Susanna Daniel, Madison “The Goddess of Illicit Choices” 

3rd Place story by Holly Hilliard, Madison  “Zugunruhe”   

Poetry readers:

1st Place by Taylor Kirby, Madison  “if I have an addiction to water, know it’s hereditary” 

2nd Place by K. E. McCoy, Madison “Climate Passover” 

3rd Place by Sheryl Slocum, Milwaukee “My Son Standing Near a Glass of Water”

Honorable Mentions

POETRY

William Stobb, Onalaska, “Ache Index” (Fall 2023)

Emily Bowles, Appleton, “This is Not a Villanelle” (Winter/Spring 2024)

Adam Fell, Madison, “A Deterioration in Talks” (Winter/Spring 2024)

Steven Espada Dawson, Madison, “Mercury Goes Right Through You” (Winter/Spring 2024)

Marnie Dresser, Spring Green, “I Hate People Who Cut in Line But” (Winter/Spring 2024)

Kelly R. Samuels, La Crosse, “Ambiguous Loss” (Winter/Spring 2024)

FICTION

John Mulvihill, New Glarus, “Not Drowning, But Waving”