As a semifinalist in the L Magazine’s “Literary Upstart” contest, I was asked to read last night at the Slipper Room. There was a sizeable and enthusiastic audience and three other semifinalists reading. At the end, the four of us were critiqued by a panel of judges, American Idol style, and one reader moved on to the finals. That one reader was not me.

I wish I could tell you the names of the other readers or of the judges, but I don’t have that information easily accessible at the moment. Maybe I’ll update later to include that. In any case, the judges’ comments were mostly superficial, and they clearly had not understood one of the major points about my story–so I really couldn’t take the whole thing very seriously.

So here for your enjoyment, is my performance from last night, which one of the judges said reminded him of a “city council meeting.”