Recommended by Rachael Carnes

What a clever play! I adore the language play and pithy humor Hoke volleys around — She makes it look easy! This would be great fun for a wide range of audiences and players, from teens to adults — in performance or a staged reading. It has a driving rhythm that draws you in, and an engaging, hilarious tension. It's the Crossword Puzzle/Sudoko Smackdown we puzzle people needed in our lives! Thank you, Ms. Hoke!

Love the bounce and rhythm of this play! Delightfully inventive, biting and truthful with a wallop of comedy. This would be soooo much fun for a creative team to bring to life, with terrific acting challenge and Kitten Technology. A timely, provocative work — with cute kittens!

I gulped this play! What a wonderful reflection on a moment in history - with depth and contemporary resonance. Four incredible parts for young actors -- rarely has there been a role like Mary! I'm stunned. Haas builds beautiful layers of meaning into Mary's world, exploring love, family, grief and ultimate transcendence, in fewer than 50 pages. If only plays performed by and for children could be this emotionally complex, this inventive and forthcoming. Immediately theatrical, with a perfect balance of intelligence and heart, this play delivers. Just - wow. Thank you!

In this tender, thoughtfully-developed play, young Mila and Angelo heal old wounds and explore an uncertain future while riffing through the present. Writer Rodriguez juxtaposes down-to-earth dialogue with heightened — yet accessible — poetry. Such a kinship between these teens, who each change and grow organically and without a false step. It's easy to love these two characters and this play.

This play is just lovely. The rhythm of the language — A lilting, inviting cadence — belies the tension and story development writer Farr packs into just ten pages. Atmospheric, historical, yet relevant and connected to the present — I care so deeply for this little trio I only just met.

Gorgeous short play. With an economic use of words, McMahon shapes a time and place that's redolent with gallows humor. This piece pulses with our current political moment -- in all its anxiety, frustration and dark humor.

I had the opportunity to read/hear this play through Playwright Center's Member Open Play. It reads aloud so easily — Warm and inviting — With big action that snowballs hysterically. At the center are Marge and Mavis — two delightful lead roles for women of an older generation. So refreshing! Writer Smith makes dialogue look easy in this lilting comedy stocked with compelling, sympathetic characters. Fun, too, to see a nostalgic small-town period piece set in recent era — The 1980's. This would be a fun show for a regional or community theater.

Diaz-Marcano's gorgeous dialogue and deep characterization creates a perfectly imperfect world. In this scene nestled inside the devastation brought on by hurricane Maria, the writer explores heavy themes without being ham-fisted or obvious. Love the way the language slips effortlessly between English and Spanish and the way the audience is gently invited into the warmth and heartbreak. Stunning, poetical monologues rise out of this work. What a gem.

A terrific play about the fragments and fractures left behind after disasters and tragedy — With a light touch, writer Tuft explores the kind of gallows humor that surviving instigates. Jordan and Alison exchange neighborly banter amidst the ruin of Alison's apartment — What will the future hold for them? And for us? Tuft's strong dialogue, pacing, dramaturgical thoughtfulness, character development and structure create a wonderful whole.

With sensitivity and sharp humor, Kaplan creates a fully-realized world — where two puppets are parents to a non-puppet kindergartener — in this play that explores the bounds of fitting in. Kaplan packs each character with terrific inventory and makes this fantastic voyage seem so real — And so relevant. Exquisite descriptions of puppet gesture and movement evoke a deep empathy — A brilliant choice. I long to see a production — With puppets baking, puppets doing dishes, puppets tangling with bureaucracy — The show also features a rare commodity: A contemporary, fully-developed character for a child actor. Bravo!