atmospheric setting

Story·Veronica Engler, age 13 — A dragon awaits knights coming to slay her, remembering her murdered family. When she recognizes her brother's killer, she chooses mercy over revenge before dying.

Story·Katherine Roth, age 13 — A girl looking after a neighbor's dog discovers the dog has escaped to find their missing cat, injured but alive in the woods after a snowstorm.

Story·Natalia M. Thompson, age 13 — A daughter asks permission for honors classes and her mother reveals regrets about marrying early instead of pursuing education, passing both blessing and burden to the next generation.

Story·Parth Ravel, age 12 — A space crew lands on planet AE-51 to establish a colony, only to discover an identical crashed ship with their same ID number and a centuries-old nametag bearing the navigator's...

Story·Gus Ruchman, age 12 — After a tsunami kills his family, an eleven-year-old Muslim boy survives with a Hindu man who teaches him that faith transcends religious boundaries before dying in his arms.

Poetry·Brooke Hemingway, age 13 — A wolf leads its pack into a moonlit clearing where the forest holds its breath and the world sparkles with otherworldly light.

Poetry·Sandra Detweiler, age 13 — A lyrical meditation on climbing above fog to find mountain peaks rising like islands from a sea of clouds below.

Poetry·Norah Brady, age 13 — Night sounds — cricket drone, rain on gutters, distant conversations — become a symphony as the world falls into sleep.

Story·Will Stroud — A young hunter describes his first archery kill, from the three-hour wait in a tree stand to the moment the deer falls, rendered in precise sensory detail.

Poetry·Edie Patterson, age 10 — A meditation on leaving paradise, watching cars diverge on a canyon highway while coyotes howl and a finch lifts off into morning light.