Posted Oct 02, 2025
Posted Oct 02, 2025
We have lined up dozens of remarkable authors, bloggers and humorists to review and rank the 2025 entries in A Hotel Room of One’s Own: The Erma Bombeck Humorist-in-Residence Program.
The judges, all established writers, will narrow the field for final judging by W. Bruce Cameron, bestselling author and humorist best known for his novel A Dog’s Purpose, and Wendy Liebman, an LA stand-up comic. The deadline to enter is midnight (EDT), Oct. 6. Two grand prize winners, finalists ($250) and honorable mentions ($100) will be announced in November.
We’re grateful to the finalist and preliminary judges who are volunteering their time to assess the applications. All entries will be randomly assigned and blind-judged. Here are the preliminary judges:
Nicky Adams, faculty member in the University of Dayton School of Business Administration. She spent the last 18 years as an English professor at UD, and her new mantra is, “Business is the name, writing’s the game.”
Melissa Balmain, editor-in-chief of Light, America’s longest-running journal of comic poetry. Her humor has appeared in The American Bystander, The New Yorker, The New York Times, McSweeney’s, Slackjaw and The Washington Post, and her latest book is Satan Talks to His Therapist (Paul Dry Books).
Anne Bardsley, a humorous and inspirational speaker and the author of How I Earned My Wrinkles, Musings on Marriage, Motherhood and Menopause, Angel Bumps, Hello from Heaven and Heartstrings from Heaven. Her work can be found in two Chicken Soup for the Soul books, Guideposts Magazine and other outlets.
John Batteiger, deputy managing editor of The New York Times News Service and biographer of 1920s newspaper columnist and humor writer Don Marquis.
Tracy Beckerman, writer of the nationally syndicated humor column, Lost in Suburbia, and the author of four books including the Amazon bestseller Barking at the Moon: a Story of Life, Love, and Kibble.
Barb Best, a veteran comedy writer, author and proud Erma Bombeck Global Humor winner. Her latest books are The Parenting Guide for Your Inner Child: HA! and The Monthly Mirth Journal.
Joel Madison Botwinick, Peabody Award-winning sitcom writer and standup comic. During his stand-up days, he wrote for numerous comedians including Rosanne Barr — who gave him his first TV writing gig. His television credits include more than a dozen shows, including The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, The Larry Sanders Show, America’s Funniest Home Videos and Malcolm and Eddie, which he created and served as co-executive producer. He frequently writes for various Judd Apatow projects. Most recently, he wrote for the HBO series Crashing.
John Branning, an award-winning humor writer and author of The Best I Can Do. He’s also a former Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop Humor Writer of the Month, a thrill he views as second only to his stint as Faye Dunaway’s stunt double in Bonnie and Clyde.
Ginger Claremohr, a national award-winning newspaper columnist, event speaker, storyteller and mother of five. Her writing has been featured in collections including Chicken Soup for the Soul, Not Your Mother’s Book on Sex and 101 True Tales from the Terminal. As the founder of Claremohr Writing Co., she ghostwrites and crafts content for thought leaders and organizations. When she’s not telling other people’s stories, she’s writing her own…a novel titled Her Charming Lovers.
Mary Ellen Collins, freelance writer and essayist who has been a humor columnist for Angie’s List Magazine and a community columnist for The Arizona Republic. Her essays have appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, Next Avenue and Oh Reader, among other publications.
Nicole Craw, editor of University of Dayton Magazine and a past alumni magazine editor at Wright State University and Antioch College. Previously, she held writing and editing roles at the Dayton Daily News, Dayton City Paper, New Orleans Magazine, New Orleans Living and Smithsonian.com. A graduate of Loyola University New Orleans, she started her journalism career editing her college newspaper The Maroon after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. She and her newspaper staff earned a Pacemaker Award for their work in 2008.
Andrea Gelfuso Goetz, author of the humorous memoir, My Modena, a Year of Fear, Laughter, and Exhilaration in Italy, a funny kids’ book, Zuri the Zebra and the Seasons of Giving, which is raising money to help animals in captivity. She also teaches law, is a mediator (not a meditator, although that’s worth a shot), and is a still-hyperventilating survivor of the 2022 Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop stand-up show.
Jason (Jase) Graves, associate professor of English and department chair of language development at Kilgore College. His humor columns appear in newspapers and magazines throughout the U.S. with the Cagle Cartoons Syndicate. He has won awards from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, Writer’s Digest, the Texas Press Association and Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop (Nickie’s Prize for Humor Writing).
Rhonda Havig, writer, reader, associate director of web and digital marketing at the University of Dayton, and former managing editor for Literary Mama.
Mary Beth Hoerner, Chicago writer, playwright and winner of Nickie’s Prize for Humor Writing. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in Dorothy Parker’s Ashes, Hypertext Bacopa Literary Review and several anthologies. Her short fiction has appeared in Halfway Down the Stairs, Hypertext and others and her journalism in the Chicago Tribune.
Jackie Hostetler, teacher, writer and author from Kansas. She writes and develops content for children’s media, including a number of successful YouTube and Netflix series. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, USA Today and Her View From Home. In 2020, she was selected as one of 21 Nickie’s Prize for Humor Writing winners, and in 2019, she was named a top-10 finalist in the Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry contest.
Leigh Anne Jasheway, a stand-up comedian, speaker and comedy writer with 29 published books, including Not Guilty of Menopause, Bedtime Stories for Dogs, and her latest (and first YA novel), Chickenzie and the Bully. She wrote monthly humor columns for Family Circle, the Register-Guard and the Comic News, and more of her writing can be found in two dozen anthologies, including the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, Sand in My Bra, and Show Us Your Wits (a collection of COVID humor she also edited).
Nancy LaFever, a writer-turned-editor, appreciates a skilled word wrangler. After writing thousands of published pieces on emotional health, humor, art and pop culture, she now lets writers and authors do the heavy lifting. A former psychotherapist, LaFever now cajoles… erhm… coaches authors to be their best selves.
Paul Lander, TV comedy writer, award-winning columnist and producer. His humor pieces have appeared in MAD, American Bystander, Weekly Humorist, McSweeney’s, National Lampoon, Robot Butt, Little Old Lady Comedy, Humor Times, Humor Outcasts and more. He’s written standup material that’s been performed on The Daily Show; Real Time; Conan; David Letterman: The Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize; and The DL Hughley Show.
Dave Larsen, communication coordinator for the University of Dayton College of Arts and Sciences and an award-winning former journalist at the Dayton Daily News and Hartford Courant. He co-wrote the weekly “Hot Topics” humor column for the Dayton Daily News.
Peggy Loftus, former USA Today reporter whose career includes a stint as assignment editor for AP Television in London.
Colleen Markley, an award-winning author, instructor and speaker. She is currently pursuing her MFA in creative writing at Columbia University, where her fiction explores the complexities and absurdities of the human experience, often through a feminist lens, and the occasional apocalypse.
Kristen Mulrooney, humor writer and editor of The Belladonna who was a 2022 grand prize winner of A Hotel Room of One’s Own: The Erma Bombeck Humorist-in-Residence Program. Her short humor has appeared in numerous outlets including The New Yorker and McSweeney’s. She is the author of several cookbooks and humor books and most recently appeared as her teenage self in Vera Bradley’s extremely millennial-coded “Most Perfect Couple” ad campaign.
Allia Zobel Nolan, writer of a lot of books, with a lot of different publishers — over 150 at last counting. Many have sold more than 100,000 copies and won a bunch of awards. Unfortunately, the awards don’t come with oodles of money, but Zobel Nolan uses them to paper over dents in her office walls. Still, she is proudest of being a 2025 William Faulkner Literary Competition Winner for her short story, “What’s for Dinner?” Her latest titles are Harriet Hurry Up and the Oh- So-Slow Day, Why Can’t My Brother Be More Like My Cat? with art by New York Times bestselling illustrator Lee Wildish, and Finding Harmony: The Kitten Who Taught Friends Kindness.
Mary Oves, professor of English in New Jersey and former op-ed writer for The New York Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer. She is the proud 2022 grand prize winner of A Hotel Room of One’s Own: The Erma Bombeck Humorist-in-Residence Program, a frequent contributor to the Chicken Soup for the Soul book series, and an essayist whose work has appeared in prestigious literary magazines all over the world.
Anne Parris, blogger and a partner in Midlife Boulevard.com, a lifestyle site for women.
Lorraine Ray, an award-winning author of the books Yes, Cheese-Us Loves Me! and Kid Pro Quo. Her other works include humorous essays in BELLA magazine, plays performed for the South Carolina Writers Association, and short stories in various anthologies, including Laugh Out Loud: 40 Women Humorists Celebrate Then and Now…Before We Forget. She is a winner of the Carrie McCray award for nonfiction and won The Saturday Evening Post limerick contest.
Kassie Ritman, journalist, author of four books and an on-air contributor to the popular “Hoosier History Live.” She avoids work by volunteering for various things — like chairing the professional contest for Women’s Press Club of Indiana and the student essay competition for Indianapolis Fortnightly Literary Club, a fixture since 1885. To be clear, Fortnightly has been around since 1885, not the chairwoman.
Lisa Page Rosenberg, a former writer, producer and director for television including Michael McKean’s Uncomfortably Close, Steve Martin: A Comic’s Life and The Man Show. Her work has been published in essay anthologies Listen to Your Mother, Letters to My Mom and True to Life Parenthood. She posted daily on her award-winning family humor blog, Smacksy, for 11 years.
Anne Saker, a journalist for 40 years who was on the Cincinnati Enquirer team that earned the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in local reporting. She is in the hall of fame of the Greater Cincinnati Society of Professional Journalists and is the author of Amid the Flowers, a memoir of working in a grocery floral department.
Kasey Shaw, an editor, journalist and essayist, with work nominated for the Pushcart Prize, AWP Intro Awards and Best of the Net.
Sherry Stanfa-Stanley, an award-winning writer and author of Finding My Badass Self: A Year of Truths and Dares, which chronicles her hilarious and enlightening year of midlife misadventures. Sherry’s writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Healthy Aging, First for Women and The Huffington Post, as well as the anthologies Fifty Shades of Funny, Laugh Out Loud, and You Do You.
Marcia Stewart, a Bay Area writer who co–edited the award-winning Sisters! Bonded by Love and Laughter, published by the Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop, and co-founded Nickie’s Prize for Humor Writing.
Jillian Van Hefty, a 2022 grand prize winner of A Hotel Room of One’s Own: The Erma Bombeck Humorist-in-Residence Program. She’s a contributing author to Sisters! Bonded by Love and Laughter after being named a winner in the Nickie’s Prize for Humor Writing competition. She’s also a former Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop Humor Writer of the Month.
Linda Wolff, an award-winning essayist, humorist and cool grandma in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared in The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, McSweeney’s and many more. Her humorous essays have been published in numerous anthologies. She is the voice behind CarpoolGoddess.com, where she proves that midlife, motherhood and the empty nest aren’t so scary.
Jerry Zezima, writer of a nationally syndicated humor column for Tribune News Service, which has contributed to the decline of the newspaper industry, and the author of eight books, all of which are crimes against literature. Possibly because beer was involved in the judging, he has won nine awards for humorous writing from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. He has one wife, two daughters, five grandchildren and many creditors. He has no interesting hobbies.