To Our Readers
Welcome to the third annual Ooligan Press Editors’ Choice e-journal. The advanced editing students in Portland State University’s Publishing Program held a short story contest in winter term 2007. Calling for unpublished stories about the self usually kept hidden, they challenged
writers to expose themselves through fiction.
In three weeks, the “Hidden Self ” contest drew many excellent entries from the Portland State
community. Every class member pored over every story. Secrets and bodies were bared. We read
tales of infidelities, impersonations, terrors, lusts, and shames. A man hid his heart, exposed outside his chest, with a vest of silver armor. A woman kept her beating heart in a box in her underwear drawer and remained young for generations. Chuck Palahniuk gave a heckler a bloody lip. A woman celebrating life made a naked skydive.
The class as a whole selected a short list of twelve stories. Then, laboriously, we settled on the top four. Each winning author is a writer to watch.
Karen Kirtley
Karen Kirtley teaches advanced editing in Portland State University’s Publishing Program.
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2007 Winners:
Second Hand by Blythe Butler
On the Night Vinnie Phelan Nearly Did the Worm by Dave Devine
Mary Me, Life by Kristin Thiel
The Hidden Self by Evan Matthews
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