Milwaukee Paranormal Conference and Cult of Weird launched a short story speculative fiction contest on the first day of Summer and now on this, one of the first days of Autumn, we are thrilled to announce the winners! We challenged people to write stories with a paranormal theme and a setting of Wisconsin as the backdrop. A fantastic response of 40 stories that chilled us to the bone crept into our inbox.

We had four judges for the contest– Matthew Wamser of Furrow (a UWM undergraduate literary journal), author Rachel Green (First Contact), author J. Nathan Couch (Goatman: Flesh or Folklore? and Washington County Paranormal)and Christina Rickman of Cult of Weird. They had quite a challenge and competition was fierce, but based on their totaled scoresheets, here are our winners:

1st Place: “The Devil in the Cornfield” by Zelia Edgar

2nd Place: “The Fortune Teller of Rhinelander” by Marlin Bressi

3rd Place: “Thinning the Herd” by Eric Montag

Honorable mentions:
“Stopping Sirens” by Cassie O’Rourke
“Beware the Bindlestiff” by Carolyn Toms-Neary

You will be able to read “The Devil in the Cornfield” in our conference program (accompanied with original art from Xeroine Illustration) and all three placing stories will be posted on our website on Oct. 30, Halloween Eve.

Our winning authors are invited to read their stories in a special session at the conference, Sunday, Oct. 16 4pm in Union Ballroom West, hosted by author Kat de Falla. The top three contest authors also get conference tickets and a prize pack that includes signed books, a gift from Grave Digger Candles and MPC merch. Honorable mentions will receive free conference tickets.

Thanks to everyone who participated, we appreciate your efforts and we hope to host the contest again next summer!

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