We are awarding a monetary prize and a complimentary print issue to readers who submit the best feedback on pieces appearing in each issue of The Summerset Review. For information on how to submit your feedback, see our Guidelines page. We have awarded from $50 to $150 in past issues. For the current issue, running now through September 1, 2009, the purse is set at $100. The following are the award winners who commented on pieces in the Spring 2009 issue. Each will be awarded $50 and a complimentary issue of our newly-released Volume Two:

Donna Volkenannt of St. Peters, Missouri Kyrra Rankine of New York, New York

We want to thank all those of you who submitted entries. We recognize the investment you've made to read our publication and write to us. We sincerely appreciate the interest.

Donna writes - Amy Willoughby-Burle's short-short "Out Across the Nowhere" in the spring issue of Summerset Review transported me to another time and place. Her descriptions of the pumpkin moon, the tiger lily field, and the Milky Way Tree are lovely. Her writing is so vivid, evocative, and clear; I could taste the Amaretto Sours, see the green and blue and "whizzy white" fireworks in the sky, hear the noises of the night, and feel the grass beneath my feet. Even more than Willoughby-Burle's captivating description, her story filled me with a sense of amazement, along with the feeling of abandonment and sadness that goes hand-in-hand from watching childhood slip away. Thank you for publishing such an evocative, moving and beautifully-written piece.

Kyrra writes about Peter Schumacher's "A Picture for the Wall" - This couple, I know them. I grew up with them, in Minnesota. They are my friends, or cousins, or former classmates, or people I met at a party. This couple, they travel to feel like they are alive, to allow themselves experiences, because their lives are so serious, their daily joys disciplined by intention and ethics and earnestness. They are good neighbors, trustworthy friends, great to accompany on a camping trip. They do not allow themselves to get addicted to the Sopranos or Chinese takeout or singing out loud to the radio in the car while the other runs into the gas station to pay for the gas and buy a Twix. They don’t fight with each other over who has to get cat litter this time, or clean the bathroom, or pay the phone bill. They are measured. They are smart. They would never travel to Mexico for their honeymoon. When Jane hesitated to buy the orange pants that illogically make her happy, and then did so, I felt hope for her. And when Adam smoked hash on the balcony, watching the prayer fires on the river, I felt hope for him. But then it became evident something was wrong. It was not when they went to the rooftop without seeing the bodies of the sick. It was not when Sanjay pressed his thumb deeply, painfully into Jane's palm. It wasn't even when Adam didn't hear Jane cry out his name, so focused was he on his photograph. What was evident, what was wrong, was that Jane didn't scream or shriek or thrash or knee or elbow or bite, and that Adam didn't notice this at the time, or later, because he was busy stealing moments from the dead behind the lens of his camera. Because there was no screaming or shrieking or thrashing or kneeing or elbowing in the lives they had created for themselves. What there was instead, was a stolen piece of salvation, some culture, and a heavy silence that would weigh on them until they tuck it away, nice and neat.