2024 Breakout! Writers Prize Winners
We are pleased to announce the winners and runners-up for the 2024 Breakout! Writers Prize which brings visibility to the creators of our literary future by honoring and supporting distinct student voices in poetry and prose. Thank you to this year’s prize judges: Manuel Muñoz (prose) and James Cagney (poetry).
This year’s winners are Marilyn Ramirez in prose, and Corey Baron in poetry. The runners-up are Theresa Dietrich and K Chiucarello in prose, Malia Chung and Johnnie Each in poetry.
And thank you to everyone who submitted to this year’s Breakout! Writers Prize!
Prose Breakout! Prize Winner:
Marilyn Ramirez
Marilyn Ramirez is a California-based writer. Her prose appears in ¡Pa'lante!, The Plentitudes, Press Pause Press, among other places, and she has been awarded the Harriet Williams Emerging Writer prize. She is fiction editor for The Plentitudes. An MFA candidate at UC Davis, Marilyn is currently at work on her first book.
About Ramirez’s winning piece, Manuel Muñoz had to say:
“Without Light” movingly pinpoints the difficult balance that siblings sometimes negotiate, caring through difficult circumstances but also maintaining one’s sense of self and possibility.
Poetry Breakout Writers Prize Winner:
Corey Baron
Corey Baron is a poet and photographer from New Rochelle, New York. He currently attends New York University where he studies Media, Culture, and Communication with a focus on visual cultures, along with creative writing. His work can be found in Muzzle. Keep up with his forthcoming work on Instagram @thecoreybaron and at coreyqbaron.com.
About Baron’s winning poem, James Cagney had to say:
"Holding On, for me, was the best poem in a stellar submission that stands above the others in its confident, lovely language. Every line feels alive and conscious. The poem commands you forward, spoon feeding you polished lines and images as a grandparent might spoon feed a toddler. The worst compliment I could give is it’s a poem I wish I wrote. The poem maintains a gentle voice, yet powers forward with passionate, concrete language."
Prose Breakout! Writers Prize Runners-up:
Theresa Dietrich and K Chiucarello
Theresa Dietrich is the 2023-24 Writers in the Public Schools Fellow at NYU where she is working on an architecturally-inspired memoir about growing up in a hundred-year-old hotel in rural Pennsylvania among four sisters, infinite cornfields, and many rooms, rooftops, and doorways. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Atticus Review, Quarter After Eight, and Teachers & Writers Magazine. You can follow her work on Instagram @trzajane and on her website: theresajanedietrich.com.
About Dietrich’s work, Manuel Muñoz had to say:
“The Falling Down House” bravely traces a history of rupture within a family, showing us how a “we” still manages to survive and recall.”
K Chiucarello is a writer living in the Hudson Valley. They edit on behalf of Empowerment Avenue and tutor on behalf of Bard Prison Initiative. They are currently at work on their debut novel which follows a woman who becomes obsessed with the idea of giving birth as a coping mechanism after leaving a violent relationship. Their work and progress can be found at kchiucarello.com.
About Chiucarello’s work, Manuel Muñoz had to say:
“Disappearing Margins” shows us that, whether we call them fables, myths, or tall tales, the stories we pass down in our families help us to honor and remember our storytellers.
Poetry Breakout! Writers Prize Runners-up:
Malia Chung and Johnnie Each
From Boston, MA, Malia Chung is the daughter of two English teachers and the eldest of three sisters. Often reading, Malia studies English and Creative Writing at Princeton University, where she has been the lucky beneficiary of amazing teaching. Malia first discovered poetry in High School, and she has spent much of her time since then in the world of writing, revising, and reading.
About Chung’s poem, James Cagney had to say:
"a tight and wonderfully rendered poem, modest in size, that packs a heavyweight wallop. It's fat-free, visually strong with stellar language and a lovely, unexpected ending."
Johnnie Each is a born and raised Iowan from a long line of preachers, teachers, farmers and engineers. She's in her first year of studying Journalism & Mass Communication and English & Creative Writing at the University of Iowa and has been scribbling poems in her notebooks since she could hold a pencil. Her senior year of high school she had the honor to serve as the Iowa Student Poetry Ambassador and received gold and silver national medals in poetry from the Scholastic Art and Writing competition. On any occasion that she isn't putting pen to paper, she's reading, hammocking or serving at her local church in Iowa City. "Where I Learned the Word Woman" is a true story, every word lovingly dedicated to Johnnie's grandma.
About Each’s poem, James Cagney had to say:
“Having gone back and forth over which poem to single out, ‘Where I Learned The Word Woman’ is the one so gorgeously lived in, it’s hard to read without thinking of all women who raised and influenced me. It feels like a novel in miniature.”
