READ ME: Stories Wait Within

2021 Writing Contest Anthology

Alice, that intrepid adventurer, was enticed by the Drink Me label on a bottle. Simple instructions with lots of meaning. After downing the contents, she lost a lot of weight (and height). Then, she found a cake with Eat Me written on it. Again, simple instructions. Sampling the cake, Alice reversed her losses, gained everything back, and then some. Unusual occurrences, sure, but they got Alice to where she wanted to be.
Aside from feeling some concern for Alice’s gullibility in trying strange foodstuffs, we admire her problem-solving skills and eventual rewards of exploring a strange world with unusual events and characters.
Do you ever wish you could have adventures and visit different and interesting places? Well, this is the perfect opportunity for everyone.
Look around. Everything you need is right here. See the Read Me tag on the cover? Just follow the simple instructions.

Go ahead, be like Alice!

ISBN: 978-1734974430
6" X 9" Paperback
138 pages
Paperback: $11.99 + s&h

KINDLE Edition: $2.99

*** FIRST PLACE ***
Phillip Frey's history includes professional actor, produced screenwriter and writer/director of three short films, one of which showed at the New York Film Festival. He is now devoted only to writing prose. He currently has the privilege of his short stories appearing in various literary journals and anthologies. www.amazon.com/author/phillipfrey

Phillip Frey

DESTINY

*** SECOND PLACE ***
Kathryn Henion's fiction has appeared in over twenty journals, including Beloit Fiction Journal, Saranac Review, Natural Bridge, and Green Mountains Review. She earned a Ph.D. in English from Binghamton University, where she was editor of the biannual literary magazine Harpur Palate. Currently she serves as fiction editor for the online journal of art and literature, Anomaly, and lives, works, and writes in Ithaca, NY.
www.kathrynhenion.com

Kathryn Henion

A GOOD MAN

*** THIRD PLACE ***
Based in North Carolina, Javon Gilchrist discovered his deep love for writing as a child. He and his older brother developed a children's story while they stayed inside during the hottest days of summer. The art of storytelling grabbed Javon's attention unlike anything had before. He continued developing his craft with the help of online writing partners and workshops. His favorite genres to write are psychological thrillers, paranormal, and crime fiction. He is currently writing his ninth book, which he intends to make his publishing debut as a novelist.

Javon Gilchrist

I COULD JUST EAT YOU UP

Scott Pedersen is a fiction writer based in Wisconsin. His work has appeared in Fiction International, The I-70 Review, Louisiana Literature, The MacGuffin and many other journals and anthologies. When not writing fiction, he enjoys performing in a traditional Celtic band.

Scott Pedersen

QUIET CLAUDETTE

Ms. Amis is an attorney and judicial officer who has always enjoyed creative writing. Her characters are inspired by the extraordinary people she has had the pleasure to meet and by the beauty of natural surroundings near her Pacific Northwest home. She enjoys gardening immensely and prefers dirt under her nails to wearing gloves.
She has published stories in Perspectives Magazine, Reminisce Extra, 2019, 2020 and 2021 Scribes Valley Publishing Anthologies, Beyond the Norm, Where Tales Grip, and Story Harvest, Linden Avenue Literary Journal, For Women Who Roar, several Writing It Real Anthologies and in 101words.com.

Virginia M. Amis

TREASURES

Steve Putnam’s short fiction has appeared in recent Scribes Valley annual anthologies, also Whiskey Island, Magazine, and Carbon Culture Review. Another, ‘Dummy in a Guard Shack’ will soon appear in Main Street Rag. Novels Academy of Reality and Loose Horse Lost, both made finalist lists in the 2019 Faulkner-Wisdom Competition in New Orleans. Both are still available for publication.

Steve Putnam

MOTHER NATURE'S PORTRAIT

Now retired, John formerly functioned as an attorney/entrepreneur – getting an idea and turning it into a business if it looked promising. Many of these did not work out. Fortunately, some were successful. The real joy in this career came from the creative and imaginative parts of starting something new. Writing fiction has proven to be a somewhat similar experience - stimulation in the act of writing, but disappointments if a work failed to be published. In his former career, all writing required was necessarily factual, formal, and dull. Learning to use language in a natural and entertaining way has been a challenge. So, it has been rewarding to have had numerous stories published or chosen as winners in competitions and contests.

John Baldwin

SEERO

Sam Corradetti is a queer writer in southern New Jersey. Their work is featured or forthcoming in vulnerary magazine, Scribes Valley Publishing, and others. They are currently pursuing an MFA at Temple University in Philadelphia where they were an editorial assistant for Tinge Magazine's Winter 2021 issue.

Sam Corradetti

SECOND WAVE

Christina Reiss has been a finalist or semi-finalist in the Howard Frank Mosher, Able Muse, Tiferet, Kallisto Gaia Press, and Great Midwest Writing short story contests and an honorable mention for the Hat Prize. She has published short stories in Fail Better, Scarlett Leaf, Pulse Peninsula, and Watershed. She lives in Vermont, works in the judiciary, is the mother of three daughters, and is married to a woodworker.

Christina Reiss

PRECIOUS

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Joseph Salerno is the product of twelve years of Catholic School, after which he attended Columbia for three years. In younger years, he held a variety of occupations (Title Searcher, Architectural Draftsman, et. al), but he has settled on being an Office Manager for a small accounting firm.
Joseph has a degree in Psychology from SUNY Empire State College. An avid short story reader and writer, he is a member of The Long Island Writer’s Guild. He has self-published thirteen chapbooks of short stories in the past nine years.
Joseph’s work has appeared in GUILDERS ’84: The Literary Magazine of Hofstra University (1984), OPEN MINDS QUARTERLY (2014), and he was a finalist for the short story prize in the SCRIBES VALLEY PUBLISHING ANTHOLOGY in 2019 and 2020.
He is an enthusiastic board game player (quite ruthless and verbal at Backgammon), and he lives with about a dozen large house plants in an apartment three blocks from the New York City limits.

Joseph J. Salerno

THE BEST MAN'S MEDLEY

Hillary Adrienne Stern wrote her first novel at the age of ten. The kind editor who rejected it encouraged her to keep on writing. Her independently published historical novel, The Garment Maker’s Daughter, was selected as an editor’s choice by the Historical Novel Society. She is currently pursuing an MFA in writing at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.
NOTE: Hillary's story does not appear in the anthology

Hillary Adrienne Stern

DON'T TELL ME HOW TO FEEL

Not even almost two years of quarantine interrupted Ronna Edelstein’s daily routine of reading, writing, tutoring (by Zoom), watching the news, walking, and napping. With the situation improving, Ronna has again returned to her beloved theatre, both as an usher and a patron. Ronna is grateful to Scribes for publishing her fourteenth story starring Vera; she also appreciates the support of Pulse: Voices from the Heart of Medicine for including her essays in its monthly online journal. Ronna attributes her writing success to her mother, father, and paternal grandmother, all of whom were avid readers and taught her to value the beauty of language; to her son and daughter, both of whom encourage her to write and consistently praise her essays and works of fiction; to the University of Pittsburgh and Northwestern University, schools that educated her on the writing process as an undergraduate and graduate student, respectively; and to her students, her extended family who gave her the opportunity to inspire them to become their own writers.

Ronna L. Edelstein

THE STORYTELLER

A. T. Perry was born and raised in the beautiful green mountains of Vermont. She enjoys writing horror and thriller fiction, but in a strange twist of fate her first completed novel is a contemporary romance, set in the wilds of Montana. She is currently working on a thriller about a small town with a big secret. She draws support and inspiration from her two amazing children, her German Shepherds, her two black cats, and her husband's never ending penchant for chaos. In her free time she joins her husband as a volunteer firefighter.

Amy T. Perry

MERCY