Posted Nov 19, 2025
Posted Nov 19, 2025
“I’m not going to lie; I look good in a robe. Specifically, white, fluffy hotel ones. From Ohio,” wrote Gretchen Cion of Berkeley, California, in her pitch for the chance to live in a hotel for two uninterrupted weeks to finish her novel.
“I’ll tell everybody about us. People will be like, ‘Hotel what?’ trying to get your number.”
Meanwhile, essayist Debra Solomon Baker of St. Louis, Missouri, used some bittersweet humor to make her case: “When I was married to my ex-husband, our children would prance around the living room, bellowing out these words, ‘Daddy’s funny. Mommy cleans. Daddy’s funny. Mommy cleans.’ (It’s) as if (they were) auditioning for a Broadway musical set in suburban Saint Louie.
“These semi-charming offspring were insightful. Their mom’s humor had suffocated, was lost, along with two purple pens and some quarters, beneath the cushions of a stained and lonely marriage. So, now, a few years post-divorce, my greatest hope is that, in between bites of stuffing and marshmallow-topped yams, I will be able to wow my family at Thanksgiving dinner, regaling them with the tale of how, with sharp and fine-tuned wit, their mother-cleaner shelled out 30 bucks and elbowed 900,000 other writers out of the competition to become humorist-in-residence in our country’s birthplace of aviation: Dayton.”
Cion and Baker, both writers and educators, rose to the top of an international competition to become the 2026 grand prize winners of A Hotel Room of One’s Own: The Erma Bombeck Humorist-in-Residence Program. Each will receive a complimentary registration to the sold-out March 26-28, 2026, Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop at the University of Dayton and be ceremonially “robed” in plush, custom-embroidered bathrobes as they begin their two-week writer’s residency at the Marriott at the University of Dayton.
The perks for the winners? Free room service. A housekeeping staff. An omelette bar. And, most importantly, the gift of time to write.
In all, the contest attracted 254 applications from 40 states coast to coast, Washington, D.C., and four countries — Australia, Canada, Germany and Switzerland. It’s sponsored by the Bombeck family and the University of Dayton Marriott.
Dozens of authors, bloggers and humorists served as preliminary judges and narrowed the field for finalist judges best-selling author W. Bruce Cameron and nationally renowned stand-up comic Wendy Liebman. They selected the two grand prize winners, finalists and honorable mentions. Here are the other writers receiving recognition:
Finalists ($250)
Bliss Goldstein
Bellingham, Washington
Kelli Huggins
Prattsville, New York
Honorable Mentions ($100)
Liz Alterman
Chatham, New Jersey
Charlie Buck
Tucson, Arizona
Dakota Cloud
Snowmass, Colorado
Grace Dobush
Berlin, Germany
Caroline Horwitz
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Ben Ren
Chaska, Minnesota
As a multi-genre writer and filmmaker, Gretchen Cion is currently working on her debut comedic novel, Trust Me and an essay collection, For Shame and Other Fun Feelings! When she’s not writing, she’s teaching at the English department at Berkeley City College or online with girls and gender-expansive youth in her music-as-inspiration course, Poetic Playlist.
“My hope is to come to the residency with a completed first draft (of my novel), so I can use this chamber of sanctuary to revise and reorganize. Think murder board with index cards and string. It’ll be breakfast-all-day energy as I get to cracking on draft two, speed balling matchas and whatever room service can deliver. My goal upon leaving is to have my bundled babe, Trust Me, submission ready to send to the agents I met at the hotel bar and beyond,” said Cion, who attended the 2022 Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop after receiving an honorable mention in the competition.
Cion’s novel revolves around a cunning, compulsive liar who learns that her dead hippy parents included a morality clause in the trust, and she has a month to make amends for her litany of lies or lose her inheritance.
“Gretchen’s self-deprecating humor shines through in her application and carries on into her fiction,” said finalist judge W. Bruce Cameron. “Her hooky premise and clever observations make for breezy, fun reading. My smiles are ready for her completed novel!”
Debra Solomon Baker, a writing coach for college-bound youth and a recently retired middle school English teacher, wants to use her hotel time to finish and revise Spirit Forward, a collection of essays — “funny and windswept with vulnerability — about gray divorce.” The work centers on sexual, emotional and intellectual rediscovery with all its complex messiness.
In her Dayton spare time, she quipped that she will “hand out ‘Bring Back Erma’ signs as couples enter obstetric wings throughout Ohio’s hospitals. That is a name that deserves another chance here in 2026.” About writing, she added, “Like many people, I write to find humor in the craziness, to make sense, to feel alive, to capture moments that I do not want to lose.”
Her application “was compelling and masterfully constructed,” said finalist judge Wendy Liebman. “Her writing is humorous and poetic, and many women will relate to her insightful perspective.”
The March 26-28, 2026, Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop is sold out, but interested writers are encouraged to put their name on the waitlist. There’s still an opportunity to win a free registration (and $1,000 cash) through the Erma Bombeck Writing Competition, sponsored by the Washington-Centerville Public Library. Previously unpublished 450-word essays in humor and human interest categories will be accepted Dec. 2-Jan. 6.