Congratulations to Emily Roese, a runner-up of the 2026 Desperate Literature Short Fiction Prize, for “Slug.”
“I’m honored and delighted to have been selected as a runner-up for the Desperate Literature Prize. I am deeply grateful for the careful work of this year’s judges, as well as the team’s editors and organizers at Desperate Literature.”
Emily Roese (she/her) is a Brooklyn-based artist interested in character studies, temporal relationships, and the general flow of things. She’s received fellowships + awards from C.R.I.T., ART-14 @ L.a. Studio, the Tow Foundation, and Desperate Literature. You can find her work in Foglifter, Everybody Press, The Southampton Review, Eleven Stories 2026, and forthcoming from The American Literary Review. She is the co-founder and co-host of The Parlor reading series.
Visit Emily’s website, www.emilyroese.com
Find Emily on Instagram @emilyroese