The Writers’ Union of Canada is pleased to announce that Kelly Pedro has won the $2,500 prize for its 33rd annual Short Prose Competition for Emerging Writers, for the best story under 2,500 words, with her piece “Terceira Rift.” The Union will submit the winning story and the eleven other shortlisted stories to three Canadian magazine publishers for their consideration.
WINNER
“Terceira Rift” by Kelly Pedro, Kitchener, ON
The jury comprised of David Huebert, Shauna Singh Baldwin, and Léa Taranto noted that “Terceira Rift” is an eloquent, lyrical, and plaintive story about the parent-child relationship. In an elegant structure, the story’s six elevation markers act as structural pacing cues that delineate narrative beats. The author mixes passages of stirring dialogue with lush, evocative prose swimming with volcanic and oceanic imagery. In the story’s governing metaphor, the titular island comes to stand in for the narrator’s precarious relationship with their mother — the emotional crux of the story. This is a tender, musical tale about ancestry, guilt, abandonment, and reconciliation.
Kelly Pedro’s stories have received nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best Small Fictions. In 2025, she was one of three recipients of the CRAFT Literary Flash Prose Prize, and her work has been shortlisted for the SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction and Room Magazine’s Fiction Prize. Her fiction has appeared in CRAFT Literary, PRISM international, The New Quarterly, Tahoma Literary Review, Fractured Lit, New Flash Fiction Review, Necessary Fiction, JMWW, and elsewhere. She is completing an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Guelph and lives and writes on the Haldimand Tract — land that was promised to the Six Nations of the Grand River. Learn more about her work at kellypedro.ca.
This year, 29 Union members donated their time and expertise to read 604 submissions and distill them into a long list of 133 stories. These stories went on to a second round of 29 readers who selected the finalists to pass on to the jury:
FINALISTS
“The Prescription,” Christine Birbalsingh, Toronto, ON
“How to Settle an Old Dog,” Pamela Dillon, Conestogo, ON
“Code 1815,” Barbara Ellison, Vancouver, BC
“Brushes with Death and Marriage,” Claudia Gahlinger, Dingwall, NS
“Sudbury Saturday Night,” Emily Groot, Sudbury, ON
“The Dumpster,” MJ Malleck, Kitchener, ON
“Devil's Grass,” Margo McCall, Winnipeg, MB
“Upstream,” Dawn Miller, Picton, ON
“Skylines,” Brett Nelson, Vancouver, BC
“Clearing the Board,” Robyn Schleihauf, Dartmouth, NS
“Liv,” Vaughn Thomas, Montreal, QC
FINAL JURY
David Huebert, Shauna Singh Baldwin, and Léa Taranto
READERS FOR THE COMPETITION
Lynda Archer, Carolyn Bennett, Dorothyanne Brown, Kevin Burns, Jenna Butler, Susan Carpenter, Ann Cavlovic, Aashisha Chakraborty, Karen Charleson, Suzanne Craig-Whytock, Angel Di Zhang, Sharon English, Irene Fantopoulos, Joanne Findon, Amy Fish, Sharon Frayne, Gord Grisenthwaite, Altaire Gural, Ken Harvey, Brenda Heald, Betty Jane Hegerat, Lisa Hrabluk, Crystal Hurdle, Suzanne Keeptwo, Eimear Laffan, Bianca Lakoseljac, Lina Lau, Sharon Lax, Jerry Levy, Charmaine Li, Alastair Luft, Tariq Malik, Vera Maloff, Lisa Martin, Janet Miller, Marianne Miller, donalee Moulton, Terry Murray, Shari Narine, Monica Nawrocki, Janet Nicol, Carol Parchewsky, Kamal Parmar, Carolyn Redl, Rick Revelle, Zoë S. Roy, Syr Ruus, Ardra Shephard, Vanessa Shields, Ann Shortell, Sandhya Singh, Catherine St. Denis, Margie Taylor, Ayla Vejdani, Anna Wagner, Susan White, David Wiseman, Isaac Yuen
– 30 –
The Writers’ Union of Canada (TWUC) is the national organization of professionally published writers. TWUC was founded in 1973 to work with governments, publishers, booksellers, and readers to improve the conditions of Canadian writers. Now almost 3,000 members strong, TWUC advocates on behalf of writers’ collective interests, and delivers value to members through advocacy, community, and information. TWUC believes in a thriving, diverse Canadian culture that values and supports writers. Learn more at writersunion.ca.
For additional information:
Kristina Cuenca, Program Manager
The Writers’ Union of Canada
kcuenca@writersunion.ca
DATE: June 11, 2026
