Short Story Contest judges

Adult and Young Adult Story Judges

Nancy Etchemendy

Nancy Etchemendy's fiction and poetry for children and adults appears regularly in various magazines and anthologies, both in the U.S. and abroad. Her work has earned a number of awards, including two Bram Stoker Awards for children's horror, a Golden Duck Award for excellence in children's science fiction, and an Anne Spencer Lindbergh Prize silver medal for excellence in children's fantasy. Her fourth novel, "The Power of Un," was published by Front Street/Cricket Books in March 2000. "Cat in Glass and Other Tales of the Unnatural," a collection of her short fiction for young adults, was published this autumn, also by Front Street/ Cricket Books. She lives and works in Northern California where her days are enlivened by an excitable terrier, her husband, Stanford Provost John Etchemendy, their son Max, and two Hondas with secret names.

Caryn Huberman Yacowitz

Caryn Huberman Yacowitz lives and writes in Palo Alto. She is currently completing a series of seven non-fiction books, each focused on a different Native-American tribe. Her other works include the picture books "Pumpkin Fiesta" and "The Jade Stone, A Chinese Folktale." The Jade Stone has recently been published as a musical children's play. Yacowitz's first book was "Onstage/Backstage," a photo-essay about the Palo Alto Children's Theater, co-authored and illustrated with JoAnne Wetzel.

Katy Obringer

Katy Obringer supervises the Children's Library, the College Terrace branch library and children's services throughout the Palo Alto library system. Obringer also worked as an elementary school teacher for 10 years and an elementary school librarian for five years before joining the Children's Library.

Ellen Sussman

Ellen Sussman's novel, "On a Night Like This," will be published by Warner Books in September 2003. She has published a dozen short stories in literary and commercial magazines. Her first novel, "The Affair," was published in Germany last year. She teaches writing through the UC Berkeley Extension and in private classes in Los Altos Hills.

Mike Nagler

Mike Nagler is the co-editor of the short story anthologies "Stolen Moments" and "Wives and Husbands." He has taught fiction-writing and film history at Canada College in Redwood City for many years.

Tom Parker

A well-known local writing teacher, Tom Parker is the author of the best-selling "Anna, Ann, Annie" and the recent "Leadership and Customer Revolution," a management book written with Gary Heil and Rick Tate. He has taught at Stanford, the University of California Extension and Foothill and Canada colleges.