I can only imagine that having editors call your short story collection a “standout” must be wonderful, garnering an award for that standout collection must result in euphoria that only the gods and Academy Award Winners can understand (I’m thinking of you, Sally Field and Cuba Gooding Jr).

But our own Mark Brazaitis has done it again. Winner of such awards as The Iowa Short Fiction Award, The George Garrett Fiction Award, and the ABZ Poetry Prize (to only name a few), Mark has a new award to add to his list: His collection The Incurables won the 2012 Richard Sullivan Prize in Short Fiction. Of course, unlike the Oscars with only a few competitors, Mark’s collection competed against many other entries, all of whom had at least one other published collection. This is no easy feat.

The only downside? We don’t get to see him give an acceptance speech worth of Roberto Benigni.

Congratulations, Mark!