Gary Peter, senior teaching specialist in the Department of Postsecondary Teaching and Learning, was recently shortlisted for the prestigious Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. His collection, Oranges, was selected as a finalist among nearly 400 submissions in the 2015 competition.

More than fifty short-story collections have appeared in the Flannery O’Connor Award series from the University of Georgia Press, which was established to encourage gifted emerging writers by bringing their work to a national readership.

For further insight into the selection process, Karin Lin-Greenberg, 2013 Flannery O’Connor Award winner for Faulty Predictions, shares her perspective on judging manuscript submissions.

In addition to impressive recognition for the Flannery O’Connor Award, Oranges was named a finalist in the 2013 New Rivers Press Many Voices Project competition, and a semifinalist for the 2014 St. Lawrence Book Award.