Meet the Grand Prize Winner of Narratively’s 2024 Memoir Prize!
We received over 600 moving submissions for this year's contest, so narrowing it down to a few was a challenge. After much deliberation, we're thrilled to announce our winners.
My 4-year-old daughter recently learned the word bittersweet and now she’s using it to describe everything she talks about: leaving grandma’s to go back home and see her dad, the end of a lovely playdate with friends, Sunday nights. It’s the same word I would use to describe wrapping up a Memoir Prize, this being our third go-round. The fun of running each contest so far has been going through the submissions and reading so much wonderful writing — the bitter part, of course, is having to choose only a handful of winners. We want to thank everyone who submitted for sharing your work — it’s been an honor to read your words. And with that, we’d like to present our two finalists: Matt Miller and Michelle DuBarry; and the grand prize winner, Lisa Williamson Rosenberg.
Lisa is a Pushcart Prize nominee with short fiction in Literary Mama and The Piltdown Review, and essays in Literary Hub, Longreads, Narratively, The Common and Mamalode. She has published two novels with Little A Books, Embers on the Wind and Mirror Me.
Here’s what this year’s esteemed judge, Jami Attenberg, had to say about Lisa’s story: “Ultimately why I chose ‘Black Girl, Blue Leotard’ was because it felt complete and fully realized — a ‘no notes’ piece, if you like. It was beautifully evocative of a certain time and place, and it was written in a confident, yet still vulnerable voice. The story was foreign to my own, and yet relatable, and I loved its bittersweet tone. I was moved by this piece.” The special sauce for Jami? “The way the author left the right amount of room around certain moments. There was just an aching balance of things left unsaid, which demonstrates a trust with the audience, and I always appreciate that.”
Keep your eyes peeled for work from the winners in the coming months. Congratulations again to everyone!