Catching Up with 2023 Grooms Prize Winner Anita Lo
Lo’s short story, “52 Pick-Up” won The Headlight Review’s 2023 Grooms Short Fiction Prize. This essay was produced by students in the course "Publishing in the 2st Century" at Kennesaw State University in the Fall of 2025.
As The Headlight Review prepares publication of “Water Falls” by Lois Wolfe, the third winner of our annual Anthony Grooms Short Fiction Prize, we thought it’d be fun to catch up with one of the previous winners. Anita Lo’s “52 Pick-Up” marked both the beginning of the prize and an early milestone in her own writing journey. Lo entered the Grooms Prize on a lark, without expecting to win, and she was surprised and excited to win the inaugural prize.
Anita’s story, which was featured in volume 2, issue 1 of The Headlight Review, follows Sammy as she grapples with various family members and tries to determine what each person owes to each other, especially her own debts for being born. The piece formed as Anita’s response to questions asked by Lydia Davis’s “Break It Down,” where the protagonist attempts to quantify the love and pain of his relationship at the end of it. The debts explored in the piece sparked the question for Anita, “How much money might I owe the world?” In “52 Pick-Up,” Lo explores how different characters might answer that question.
Being the first short story she had written from start to finish, “52 Pick-Up” winning boosted Anita’s confidence in her writing. She explains, “Previously, most of my stories had been cobbled together from other fragments that seemed to fit.” However, beginning with a coherent premise allowed her to outline a plot to work from giving the story more complexity than if she had undefined characters and abstractions. With “52 Pick-Up,” Anita not only achieved clarity in her style and voice, she also created a momentum that would bring her into the next stages of her writing journey.
Anita credits her father, who read her Greek myths from a big, illustrated book before bed. As time went on, she realized that she and her father were both mispronouncing the language of the myths they were reading. Consequently, she loves including rich and magical details, but characters will often humorously misunderstand the challenges they face and the windfalls they're granted. This the experience of goofiness and reverence Lo wants to reflect in her writing today.
Another influence on Anita’s writing is the idea of receiving feedback from publishers. When she received positive feedback from a magazine that requested a revision even though they don’t usually accept revisions, she decided to take a good hard look at the talent and generous readers and editors who interpret every submission. She realized that feedback is an act of care and that the revision of her work for them was better than what she originally submitted. Lo continues to improve because she is constantly trying to develop the mental fortitude and discipline to face the blank page.
Anita’s past successes have helped shape her present writing practice. Writing is a selfless act, according to Lo. The words are her own, but she doesn’t safeguard them. Instead, she disperses them to those dearest to her. She communicates using resonant, empathetic language, and she considers both the animate and the inanimate as she draws from her surrounding environment in her work. Her cousin’s old cat and the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens are equally inspiring. Her audience also serves as a muse, especially her mother, who she holds in high regard. Her mother’s advice also informs some of Anita’s writing. Other stories, such as those in Ling Ma’s Bliss Montage, inspire Anita’s present work as well.
Currently, Anita is split between multiple works in progress. She prefers it that way. One touches on “a woman’s encounter with her neighbor [that] reminds her of a childhood friend.” Another focuses on “a mother [who] discovers that her bedtime story set[s] her two twins on divergent life paths.” The third centers on “two sisters [who] discover that one of them is turning into salt.” Some stories, she says, are currently in the drafting stage, while others are either being revised or edited. We look forward to reading more of Lo’s work soon, and we’re eager to share our current Grooms Prize winning story, “Water Falls” by Lois Wolfe, later this Spring.
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Jordyn Hatten is a creative who is passionate about using storytelling to connect and uplift others. She is currently working on her Master’s in Professional Writing
Adeola Awe is an Afro-Caribbean American writer. She has a B.S. in Psychology with a minor in Neuroscience. Awe is also a registered yoga teacher with a 200-hour (RYT) certification. Presently, she is a student in the Master of Arts in Professional Writing (MAPW) program at Kennesaw State University. She has two self-published poetry chapbooks: Say More With Less and VENomoUS. She considers herself a newfound creative with the aim of healing others through varied mediums.
Jessica Reyes-Barahona is a graduate of Kennesaw State University, where she earned a BA in English and a Professional Editing and Publishing Certificate. Her work focuses on editing and creative writing, with interests in gender and women’s studies, queer theory, and visual storytelling.
