family bonds

Story·Pauline McAndrew, age 9 — A girl arrives at a family gathering in North Carolina, plays with cousins, collects wood for a fire, and finds home in the sensory details of the reunion.

Story·Morgan Biagioni — A girl arrives at a family gathering in North Carolina, plays with cousins, collects firewood, and finds home in the sensory details of the reunion around a bonfire.

Story·Marlena Rohde, age 12 — Two sisters discover magical golden seaweed that cures illness, but when a greedy friend threatens them for it, they escape to join an underwater community of glowing creatures.

Personal Narrative·Kyle Wu, age 9 — A nine-year-old experiences his first total solar eclipse from a South Carolina balcony, mixing scientific facts with sensory details and family moments.

Poetry·Sara Chebili, age 13 — A grandson builds a chair beside an avocado tree he planted, hoping to help his grandmother with memory loss remember their shared moments by the shore.

Story·Lucy Zanker, age 11 — A girl and her robotic brother accidentally launch themselves into space on their father's NASA rocket, forcing her to disassemble him to return home safely.

Story·Bailey Curtin, age 11 — A girl walks a PEI beach at dawn carrying her sister's stolen ashes, confronting grief until a mysterious dove appears and draws their family's secret symbol in the sand.

Story·Sadie Perkins, age 13 — A girl visits her dying grandmother in a nursing home, struggles with grief after her death, then feels her grandmother's presence return to comfort her.

Story·Bailey Curtin, age 11 — After her sister Jade dies from a brain tumor, Cate steals some ashes and walks to a PEI beach where a mysterious dove appears and draws their family's safety symbol...

Poetry·Tatiana Rebecca Shrayer, age 9 — A father and daughter venture into the woods to craft a bow and arrows, transforming branches into instruments that sing and shoot arrows toward stars that scamper like foxes.