Discover Nikkei

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2nd Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest


June 29, 2015 - Oct. 12, 2015

The Little Tokyo Historical Society conducted its second annual short story (fiction) writing contest which concluded on April 22, 2015 at a reception in Little Tokyo in which the winners and finalists were announced. Last year's contest was entirely in English whereas this year's contest also had a youth category and a Japanese-language category, with cash prizes awarded for each category. The only requirement (other than the story could not exceed 2,500 words or 5,000 Japanese characters) was that the story had to involve Little Tokyo in some creative manner.

Winners (First Place)

Some of the Finalists to be featured are:

      English:

      Youth:

      Japanese (Japanese only)


*Read stories from other Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contests:

1st Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
3rd Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
4th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
5th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
6th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
7th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
8th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
9th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>
10th Annual Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest >>


fiction Little Tokyo

Stories from this series

Fish Market In Little Tokyo

Oct. 12, 2015 • Nathaniel J. Campbell

The white noise of the ocean washed over the shore and reached for the cloudless sky. Wave after wave. The surf rolled slowly onto the beach. Wave after wave. The foam met the sand, and the sand met the foam. The wind— Yukio woke to the sound of his alarm. A monotone digital beep rang out three times before he turned it off and moved to the side of his bed. Half covered, he reached for his bedside lamp and …

MITATE CLUB

Oct. 5, 2015 • Miyuki Sato

1 In the last 15 minutes of the online auction, the price rose, and the small drawer I was after went for 78,000 yen. I had decided to bid up to 5,000 yen, but the bidding got heated. The item I received was sturdier than I expected. The top drawer was divided into two, and the middle and bottom drawers had no dividers. After opening the top drawer and putting in my pens and scissors, I opened the bottom drawer. …

Kazuo Alone

Sept. 28, 2015 • Linda Toch

Kazuo embraced Mondays like no other, and that was because of its silence. Mondays were sweet, a sweep of semi-peace in the streets of Los Angeles. The typical street-crawlers were in school and the typical tourists at their nine to five jobs, and so Kazuo chose Monday to roam, map, conquer his neighborhoods unperturbed. Mondays were a convenience only when eighty-five of your years had passed and your company along with it. It was nice timing for those who desired …

Hotel Man

Sept. 21, 2015 • Michie Wakabayashi

The area is designated as a historical preservation area, and old buildings cannot be demolished or remodeled. Next to the hotel are a row of small shops and restaurants, and on the wall at the end of the row is an etched sign indicating that the area is designated as a historical building. The streets of Ichi-machi are lined with three- and four-story buildings, closely packed together. There is almost no space between the buildings. Restaurants, souvenir shops, general stores, …

Masao and the Bronze Nightingale

Sept. 14, 2015 • Rubén “Funkahuatl” Guevara

Boyle Heights, 1940 “Hey Masao, where did you score those fine drapes, ese?” “Over on Brooklyn and Soto. Manny Garcia’s uncle has a tailor shop there.” “Órale pues, you’re lookin’ sharp, vato!” “Thanks, Lil’ Joe, ay te watcho, catch you later, carnal!” Yeah, Masao Imoto knew how to dress sharp alright. He was a Japanese American nisei zoot suitor, a pachuke, Japanese slang for pachuco. The older generation called them yógore “those that get dirty drinking and gambling hanging out …

The Queen of Manzanar

Sept. 7, 2015 • Hans Weidman

In a museum in Little Tokyo there is a small space segregated by room dividers, and each of these artificial walls is covered with monochrome photographs. It was by accident that Ken came across this room. At first he was lured in by the pictures of old blue sedans and steam locomotives. Moving further along the wall, he saw pictures with crowds of people wearing overcoats and hats and carrying large suitcases. On the next wall, the scenes shifted entirely. …

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Authors in This Series

Nathaniel J. Campbell lives and writes in Fairfield, Iowa, but he dreams of being able to spend more time in Little Tokyo. He has been published over a dozen times in print and online in venues including Lincoln Memorial University's Drafthorse Literary Journal and the New School's Eleven and A Half Journal. He works for a small university press and loves reading and writing in his free time.

Updated October 2015


Don Fenton received a BA in Creative Writing from the University of Texas at El Paso and a MA in Humanities with an emphasis in Aesthetics from the University of Texas at Dallas. He is currently working on a collection of short stories that reflect multicultural influences and their intersection within American culture, which mirrors his own global upbringing as Japanese-Mexican American. Don currently teaches English as a Second Language in
Dallas, Texas. When he is not teaching, he is writing.

Updated August 2014


Rubén “Funkahuatl” Guevara is a native Angelino and over the past 50 years has worked as a musician, record producer, journalist, poet, film actor, playwright-performance-theater artist, teacher, and activist. He is a UCLA graduate in World Arts & Cultures and lives and works in Boyle Heights. www.tantrikfunk.net.

Updated October 2014


After 15 years of working life in Tokyo, I finally achieved my dream of studying at a graduate school in the United States. I first went to Little Tokyo to shop for Japanese ingredients, but as I learned more about the history of Japanese Americans, I became interested in the drama behind it. Since then, I have visited the Japanese American National Museum and read documents, and I try to learn whenever I can. My specialty is psychology, so I hope to continue to learn about different types of life and understand the human heart.

(Updated August 2015)


Sarena Kuhn attends Los Alamitos High School. She enjoys learning, writing, and going on adventures. With a Japanese American mother and a Caucasian father, she is proud to be “hapa” and values the importance of preserving and sharing culture.  She has strong passions for literature and working with others. 

Updated September 2016


Kent is a second generation Japanese American attorney and part-time writer. In his free time he likes to enjoy all that Southern California has to offer, including perpetual 72 degree weather, sandy beaches, and Dodger baseball. He lives in Glendale, California with his girlfriend and their two precocious cats.

Updated August 2015


Jan Morrill was born and (mostly) raised in California. Her mother, a Buddhist Japanese American, was an internee at Tule Lake and Topaz during World War II. Her father, a Southern Baptist redhead of Irish descent, retired from the Air Force. Jan’s award-winning historical fiction, The Red Kimono, and other short stories and memoir essays reflect growing up in a multicultural, multi-religious, multi-political background.

While working on the sequel to The Red Kimono, Jan enjoys conducting workshops on writing and speaking about the history of the Japanese American internment. For more information, please visit Jan’s website at www.janmorrill.com.

Updated June 2015


Kiyoshi Parker was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He shares heritages with two countries: America and Japan, and spends time between the two whenever possible. He taught himself Japanese in his late teens. He has some critical success as an author with his novelette, The Death of Death, currently available on Amazon. His other full length novella, Autonomously Yours, is also available on Amazon, and he is currently working on several more short stories and another full length fantasy novel. He enjoys graphic design, television, and film.

Updated June 2015


Chester Sakamoto is a self-proclaimed bibliophile and avid reader. A 26-year-old native of Los Angeles, he is currently in pursuit of an M.A. in English with an emphasis in American Literature. He enjoys singing, food, cinema, and frequent trips to independent bookstores.

Updated July 2015


Born in Saitama Prefecture. Graduated from Kokugakuin University in 2002. Works in accounting and general affairs, and writes in his free time. Currently, in addition to novels, he also writes scripts for rakugo, and hopes that one day his works will see the light of day.

(Updated January 2016)


Jerome Stueart is an Ohio-based fiction writer whose work has been published in Geist, Fantasy, Lightspeed, Joyland, and other journals and anthologies. He is the co-editor of Wrestling With Gods, a speculative fiction anthology that looks at faith, and of Imaginarium 4: the Best Canadian Speculative Writing. His first novel, One Nation Under Gods, re-imagines a U.S. History with “divine help,” and is due out November 2016. He writes, paints, and sketches and lives with a bear in Vandalia, OH. Find him at jeromestueart.com.

Updated August 2015


I am currently a senior at Temescal Canyon High School and will be attending Soka University of America this fall. While I hope to pursue a career in speech language pathology, I also want to continue writing in congruence to my studies. I am a very proud Cambodian American. My father arrived in California in the 1970s to escape the Khmer Rouge, and my mother in the 1990s. My parents came to America with nothing but a willingness to learn a language and culture they didn’t yet know, and seeing this dedication as a young child made me grow into loving reading and writing.

Updated September 2015


Born in 1936. Mother of three. Worked in the accounting department of San Joquin County, California for 30 years. Founded the poetry magazine "Koncho" in 2002. Currently, 103 issues have been published. Published works in magazines such as "Heisei", Nikkan Sun, "Poem Town", and "Nihon Futurism". Poem collections include "Milky Way" and "Patchwork Voice". Edited "Koncho 100th Issue Commemorative Selection".

(Updated September 2015)


Hans Weidman is a financial analyst in Los Angeles, California. He holds a B.A. in English Literature from UCLA.

Updated September 2015