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 fourth novel, "The Power of Un," was published by Front Street/ Cricket books in March 2000. Her work has earned a number of awards, including two Bram Stoker Awards for children's horror, and a Golden Duck Award for excellence in children's science fiction. She lives and works in Northern California where her days are enlivened by an excitable terrier, a cat given to scientific experimentation, her husband, Stanford Provost John Etchemendy, their son Max, and two Hondas with secret names. For further details, surf to http://www.sff.net/people/etchemendy.

Caryn Huberman Yacowitz

Caryn Huberman Yacowitz is the award-winning author of 11 books for young people, including "Pumpin Fiesta" and "The Jade Stone, A Chinese Folktale." Her recent titles include a non-fiction series about Native American Tribes for Heinemann Library. She has just completed a musical play entitled "Jeans! An Historical Folk Musical," co-written with playwright Diane Claerbout and lyricist Enid Davis. The East Coast premiere is set for summer 2004. She teaches writing at City College of San Francisco and is a manuscript consultant. Caryn lives in Palo Alto. For writing tips and publishing information, surf to www.carynyacowitz.com

Katy Obringer

Katy Obringer recently retired as the supervisor of Palo Alto's Children's Library after 22 years with the Palo Alto library system. Obringer also worked as an elementary school teacher for 10 years and an elementary and school librarian for five years. Her love of introducing children to books will continue in her retirement.

Ellen Sussman

Ellen Sussman's novel, "On a Night Like This," will be published by Warner Books in February 2004 and translated into six languages. She teaches writing classes through 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.