LiteraryUpstart

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Ladies and gentlemen, we'd love to invite you to this year's Literary Upstart: The Search for Pocket Fiction, our annual competitive reading series, in which the city's finest unknown writers are showcased/pitted against one another in a short-fiction Thunderdome, for the ultimate prize of an enormous novelty check and publication in our Summer Fiction Issue.

This year we're moving up in the world: our readings will be held at Williamsburg's new, quite schmancy Wythe Hotel. The seminals begin next month: mark your calendar for Thursday, May 10; Thursday, May 24; Thursday, May 7; and the grand finale, featuring the semifinal winners, on Wednesday, June 27.

After the jump, meet (or renew your acquaintance with) the local literati who'll be on hand to judge and pick winners at each reading.