The 11th annual Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU) Fall Fiction Contest brought writers from across the country together for a chance to win a scholarship to SNHU and publication in The Penmen Review. After receiving hundreds of submissions, a panel of creative writing experts considered several factors during their review, including originality, structure, character arc, language and whether the story was engaging.
Once the judging concluded, the top-scoring stories made it to the voting round, and the public weighed in on their favorites. The winners of the 2025 Fall Fiction Contest are:
- First Place: How to Eat a Pomegranate by Caitlyn Burry
- Second Place: The Hope Index by Jacqueline Coleman
- Third Place: Home Base by Jess Prosser
- Fourth Place: Stone Teeth by Andrea Lisowski
- Fifth Place: The Replacement Shift by Ryan Fagan
The top three writers received $3,000, $2,000 and $1,000 scholarships, respectively, that can be applied to an SNHU undergraduate or graduate degree program.
All five stories earned publication in The Penmen Review, and the writers will have an opportunity to read their work at a Word for Word virtual event on Wednesday, January 14, 2026 (register to attend the event here).
Meet the Winners
The 2025 finalists represent a wide range of writing experiences, with unique educational journeys and career goals. Their stories explore a variety of themes, providing fresh insights that resonated deeply with readers.
First Place
Caitlyn “C.E.” Burry is drawn to pomegranates. “There is such intense symbolism surrounding a pomegranate, specifically in the form of love and gentleness. It is often quoted, ‘A pomegranate is worth the mess it makes to eat,’ and that translates to humans too–the individual is worth the mess. Eating a pomegranate is a delicate task whose mess is unavoidable, and that mess is okay.”
Burry wrote the 2025 Fall Fiction Contest’s winning piece, “How to Eat a Pomegranate.” She says, “It feels surreal to have placed first in a contest of nearly 900 entries. I’m not one who usually wins anything, ever—so this experience has been gratifying. To have my writing be recognized by others for the first time in my career is an incredible feeling.”
Currently, Burry is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in English and Creative Writing at SNHU. She’s keeping an eye out for remote creative writing internships that focus on publishing and editing. After graduation, she plans to find a full-time position in any related field to support her as she finishes her novel.
Second Place
Jacqueline Coleman has wanted to be a writer since elementary school. “Jane Austen was my hero, and I used to tell myself I’d “live by my pen” one day. That passion grew into a career in PR and communications, where I spent more than a decade writing for major Fortune 500 companies. My words have been seen by millions, even if my name wasn’t on them. Now, as I pursue my MFA in Creative Writing at SNHU, I’m finally turning that lifelong dream toward my own stories.”
Coleman wrote the second-place story in the 2025 Fall Fiction Contest, “The Hope Index.” She identifies herself as a “‘word-vomit first, refine later’ kind of writer, but I like to have a loose plot in mind before I dive in. Before drafting, I usually check in with myself about the tone I’m aiming for, the symbolism I want to thread through the piece (in this story, the stars and the absence of names), and the emotional destination I want to reach. I also think intentionally about my character’s arc—or, in this case, the lack of one. I didn’t want my protagonist to become more likable or grow meaningfully; I wanted her stuck in the same loop, with only one shift: she no longer bothers to memorize the names of the children she sponsors.”
Coleman is a Michigan-based writer currently finishing her thesis in the online MFA program at SNHU. After graduation, she hopes to secure a literary agent and begin the path towards publication.
Third Place
Jess Prosser served as a writer’s assistant for the first five seasons of Criminal Minds and was once asked by the producer to guide a tour for a group of military wives, who were huge fans of the producer’s other show, Army Wives. While showing them around, Prosser began to ask questions about living on a military base: “All day long they are hearing and feeling training maneuvers, gunfire and explosions. It shifted my perspective wondering what it must be like to be at home wondering if your husband was alive or not in a war zone, feeling the actual effects of a war zone all day. Most of them have children who live on the base, who also hear and feel the ‘training’ all day long. It sounded like adding trauma on top of trauma in the one place you’re supposed to feel safe – your home.”
Prosser wrote the third-place winning story, “Home Base.” He says, “One woman’s husband’s job was to train a unit of soldiers how to survive in the urban war zone they’d be entering. He would train them and then be with them in their last days before deployment. Then he would deploy with them, get them up and running, and then leave to come home, knowing not all of them would survive and there was nothing he could do about it.” It had been years since Prosser wrote a short story, but he used the ideas collected while guiding these military spouses around to craft his piece.
Prosser is pursuing an online MFA in creative writing so he can teach at the college level.
Fourth Place
Andrea Lisowski takes vacations in places she wants to write about and loves the American West. Her themes include grief, trauma, love, and recovery. Lisowski won fourth place in the 2025 Fall Fiction Contest with “Stone Teeth.” She is a part-time professional and a full-time student of life and literature, currently pursuing a BA in creative writing at SNHU.
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Fifth Place
Ryan Fagan worked at the HQ of a major retailer, which served as inspiration for the fifth-place winning piece, “The Replacement Shift.” With a writing background that includes a Substack on current events, he has had little experience writing or submitting fiction. However, he drew on his time working retail during the holidays, recalling the many scenarios he encountered and the coworkers he worked with—“I then spent a few evenings getting it typed up and refined enough to my liking.”
Fagan currently lives in Minnesota working in merchandising for a major retailer. He’s a marketer at heart, so he’s hoping to make the jump from merchandising to marketing once he finishes his Masters.
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