Dawn Ryan

 

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Twitter: @dawnr1215

A note about the winning story from our panel of judges: 

THE CATS by Dawn Ryan

This story was a haunting yet quiet fable set on a mysterious post-tragedy beach where seemingly only two children have survived. Neither polemic nor preachy, the folk tale of an ancestor brings hope to the children as they are forced to grow up too quickly in a bleak world. Full of vivid imagery and subtle character building, the story surprised our readers with its powerful and inevitable ending. We can’t wait for you to see it in Dreamers Writing!

Author’s Bio

Dawn Ryan is a writer and middle school teacher. She received her MFA from Rutgers University in Newark, NJ under the tutelage of Jayne Anne Phillips, Tayari Jones, and Alice Elliott Dark. Her first publication was a surprise to her. Maxim Jakubowski discovered one of her stories online and included it in his anthology Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica. Her stories have also appeared in McSweeney’s Quarterly ConcernCagibiAmerican Short Fiction, and Gargoyle Magazine. She lives in Brooklyn with her wife and daughter who are the inspiration for her current novel-in-progress The Never Forget Machine: a dark and campy adventure set in a Siberian Gulag circa 1943. She is humbled by the many opportunities afforded to her through the Pen Parentis Fellowship, and she is grateful to be among this community of writers during our perplexing and precarious moment in time.