This Lit Show features recent Writers’ Workshop graduate Chinelo Okparanta, whose short story “America” is a centerpiece of Granta‘s new “Exit Strategies” issue. Granta editor Ellah Allfrey will join her in the studio by phone.

On Thursday, February 9th [...]]]> Season 05
Episode 03
Air date: February 8th at 2 PM CST

This Lit Show features recent Writers’ Workshop graduate Chinelo Okparanta, whose short story “America” is a centerpiece of Granta‘s new “Exit Strategies” issue. Granta editor Ellah Allfrey will join her in the studio by phone.

On Thursday, February 9th at 7 PM, Okparanta will join Ben Marcus, author of The Flame Alphabet, for a reading at Prairie Lights.

Season 05
Episode 04
Air date: Thursday, February 9th, at 3 PM CST

On this Lit Show, Ben Marcus discusses his new novel, The Flame Alphabet. Marcus is the author of two previous books, The Age of Wire and String and Notable American Women, and the co-author [...]]]>

Season 05
Episode 04
Air date: Thursday, February 9th, at 3 PM CST

On this Lit Show, Ben Marcus discusses his new novel, The Flame Alphabet. Marcus is the author of two previous books, The Age of Wire and String and Notable American Women, and the co-author (with artist Matthew Ritchie) of The Father Costume.

Marcus’s work centers (or de-centers) around language, mythology, and a perverse rationality that leaves the reader equal parts befuddled and captivated. The Age of Wire and String matches the prose style of technical writing and travel books to surreal, dreamy anecdotes and definitions. Notable American Women is no less experimental, turning familiar postmodern tropes (such as the inclusion of the author as character) inside-out.

Marcus will chat with co-host Ben Mauk about The Flame Alphabet, a novel in which a mysterious epidemic has caused language to become toxic.

On Thursday, February 9th, Ben Marcus will read at Prairie Lights in Iowa City, 7 PM.

This Lit Show spotlights Ink Lit Mag, a new student-run literary journal at the University of Iowa. Ink‘s publishers discuss the origins and future of the magazine, as well as their vision for its role in the community.

On-air guests include [...]]]> Season 05
Episode 02
Air date: 1/25/2012 at 2 PM

This Lit Show spotlights Ink Lit Mag, a new student-run literary journal at the University of Iowa. Ink‘s publishers discuss the origins and future of the magazine, as well as their vision for its role in the community.

On-air guests include Michael Leali, Ink executive board Member; Sevy Perez, Ink co-editor and chief creative director of Issue One; Alyssa Rhodes, poetry editor; Audrey Smith, Ink executive board member; and Danny Khalastchi, Ink‘s publisher, who is the Assistant Director of the Undergraduate Certificate in Writing Program.

This episode also features Alyssa Rhodes reading selected student work from the magazine, and Danny Khalastchi shares one of poet Marvin Bell’s contributions to Ink‘s first issue: “Thirteen Statements About Writing Poetry (Work-In-Progress).”

GUEST BIOS

Daniel Khalastchi is the Assistant Director of the Undergraduate Certificate in Writing Program at the University of Iowa and the author of Manoleria, winner of the Tupelo Press First Book Award for poetry. A co-founder and editor of Rescue Press (an independent publisher of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and hybrid collections), Daniel serves as the faculty advisor and publisher of Ink Lit Mag.

Michael Leali is a senior studying English and Secondary Education from Oswego, IL. He is also in the Undergraduate Creative Writing Track and a minor in music. For the past two years, Michael has been the IWLLC RA and has loved every moment of it.

Sevy Perez was born and raised around Chicago. His creative philosophy is rooted in music. In high school he received formal editor and design training from Ball State University and Indiana University, and he came to the University of Iowa because David Foster Wallace made him want to be a writer, among other things. Sevy is in the middle of creating his own major in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and is also minoring in Philosophy and declaring for the new Undergraduate Certificate in Writing.

Alyssa Rhodes is originally from Denver, but just moved back from Singapore. A first-year student here at the UI, she is the Poetry Editor at Ink Lit Mag and is majoring in journalism.

Audrey Smith is a sophomore at the University of Iowa and is a Resident Assistant for the Iowa Writers’ Living Learning Community. She is studying English and is part of the Creative Writing Track.

On this Lit Show, fiction writer and essayist Sara Levine discusses her debut novel, Treasure Island!!!, a full-throated, subversive, and very funny homage to Robert Louis Steveson’s classic. We talked about how she came to the original Stevenson classic, how to craft an [...]]]> Season 05
Episode 01
Air date: 1/23/2011, 2PM CST

On this Lit Show, fiction writer and essayist Sara Levine discusses her debut novel, Treasure Island!!!, a full-throated, subversive, and very funny homage to Robert Louis Steveson’s classic. We talked about how she came to the original Stevenson classic, how to craft an unreliable narrator, and the American obsession with self-help books.

Levine, who was formerly a professor at the University of Iowa’s Nonfiction Writing Program, has published short fiction in American Short Fiction, The Iowa Review, and elsewhere. Her collection, Short Dark Oracles, was a finalist for the 2010 Caketrain Chapbook Competition.

In the last third of the program, Sara Levine reads a selection from the book.

Episode 15

Air date: 12/7/2011, 2 PM CST

Students and alumni of Iowa’s graduate writing programs share new work. Featuring Charlene Choi, Michael Fauver, Deborah Kennedy, B.J. Love, Anna Morrison, Rebecca Rukeyser, Montreux Rotholtz, and Ben Shattuck.

Authors and Works

Rebecca Rukeyser, from “The Chinese Barracks”

Montreux Rotholtz, five poems

Episode 14

Air date: 11/17/2011

On this Lit Show, University of Iowa students Jessica Dvoracek and Kallie Holt turn the microphone on the program’s host, Joe Fassler. They asked him about his experiences interviewing touring authors at KRUI, as well as his ongoing work as fiction writer, journalist, and musician. Fassler read the [...]]]> Season 04

Air date: 11/17/2011

On this Lit Show, University of Iowa students Jessica Dvoracek and Kallie Holt turn the microphone on the program’s host, Joe Fassler. They asked him about his experiences interviewing touring authors at KRUI, as well as his ongoing work as fiction writer, journalist, and musician. Fassler read the opening of his short story, “Canada Goose,” and performed two original songs.

Dvoracek and Holt are two students participating in Iowa’s “American Lives” course, in which undergraduates profile writers who live in Iowa City. Each semester, the students prepare their original research and multimedia documentation for the UNESCO City of Literature iPhone app.

Episode 13

Air date: 11/16/2011, 2 PM CST

This week, Peter Orner returns to The Lit Show to discuss Love and Shame and Love, his second novel.

We talked about the midwest, the book’s many short, impressionistic passages, memory and narrative, and the tawdry allure of Chicago politics.

Orner [...]]]> Season 04

Air date: 11/16/2011, 2 PM CST

This week, Peter Orner returns to The Lit Show to discuss Love and Shame and Love, his second novel.

We talked about the midwest, the book’s many short, impressionistic passages, memory and narrative, and the tawdry allure of Chicago politics.

Orner will read and sign copies at Prairie Lights in Iowa City on Wednesday, November 16th at 7 PM.

Peter Orner’s fiction and non-fiction has appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Granta, The Paris Review, McSweeney’s, and many other publications. His stories have been anthologized in Best American Stories and twice won a Pushcart Prize. Orner was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship (2006), as well as the two-year Lannan Foundation Literary Fellowship (2007-2008). A film version of one of Orner’s stories, “The Raft” with a screenplay by Orner and the film’s director, Rob Jones, is currently in production and stars Ed Asner.

Esther Stories (Houghton Mifflin/​ Mariner, 2001) was awarded the Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Goldberg Prize for Jewish Fiction, and was a Finalist for the Pen Hemingway Award and the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Award. Esther Stories was a 2001 New York Times Notable Book. Of the book, Margot Livesey wrote in the New York Times Book Review, “Orner doesn’t simply bring his characters to life, he gives them souls.”

The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo (Little, Brown, 2006) is set in Namibia where Orner lived and worked in the early 1990′s. The novel was a Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, a San Francisco Chronicle Best-Seller, and winner of the Bard Fiction Prize. The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo has been translated into French, Dutch, Italian, and German.

Orner is also the editor of two non-fiction books, Underground America (2008) and Hope Deferred: Narratives of Zimbabwean Lives (co-editor Annie Holmes, 2010), both published by McSweeney’s/​ Voice of Witness, an imprint devoted to using oral history to illuminate human rights crises around the world. Harper’s Magazine wrote, “Hope Deferred might be the most important publication out of Zimbabwe in the past thirty years.”

Listen to Peter Orner in his first appearance on the program, in March 2011, when he discussed his previous book, Hope Deferred: Narratives of Zimbabwean Lives.

Episode 12

Air date: 11/11/2011, 1 PM CST

On this episode of the Lit Show, co-host Ben Mauk talks with Michael Martone about teaching, writing, and the Midwest.

Martone’s large body of work confuses the boundaries of fiction and fact, memoir and essay. At the same time he has emerged as a [...]]]> Season 04

Episode 12

Air date: 11/11/2011, 1 PM CST

On this episode of the Lit Show, co-host Ben Mauk talks with Michael Martone about teaching, writing, and the Midwest.

Martone’s large body of work confuses the boundaries of fiction and fact, memoir and essay. At the same time he has emerged as a defining chronicler of the Midwestern experience, and he has edited several collections of essays and photographs in an effort to define that amorphous region.

Martone was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and is currently Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program at the University of Alabama. He is the author of, most recently, Four for a Quarter, a work of fiction whose subject and structure are defined by the number four. He is also the author of Racing in Place: Collages, Fragments, Postcards, Ruins; Unconventions: Attempting the Art of Craft And the Craft of Art; Michael Martone, The Blue Guide to Indiana, and Double-Wide: Collected Fiction of Michael Martone, which includes five of his earlier books.

Joining Martone for this episode is a roundtable of former students–fiction and nonfiction alumnae of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop–to discuss their experiences studying with him, and their own teaching and writing lives. Rachel Yoder, Dylan Nice, and Zachary Tyler Vickers join us at the half hour.

This episode, part one of a two-part series, featured, in alphabetical order: Park Chansoon (South Korea), Naseer Hassan (Iraq), Usha K. R. (India), Fabienne Kanor, (France), Alexandra Petrova (Russia), Ogochukwu Promise (Nigeria), and Milena Oda (Germany).

Since 1967, over a thousand writers from more than 120 countries have attended the IWP at the University of Iowa. Every fall semester, several dozen established and emerging creative writers—poets, fiction writers, dramatists, and [...]]]> On this Lit Show, writers from the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program read fiction, poetry, and non-fiction.

Since 1967, over a thousand writers from more than 120 countries have attended the IWP at the University of Iowa. Every fall semester, several dozen established and emerging creative writers—poets, fiction writers, dramatists, and non-fiction writers— come to the University to make time for their writing, take part in Iowa City’s literary culture, and experience daily life in America. For many IWP writers, the residency provides their first direct experience of the United States. The minimum requirement for consideration is that each writer has published at least one book, and has sufficient English language proficiency.

This episode, part one of a two-part series, featured, in alphabetical order: Park Chan Soon (South Korea), Naseer Hassan (Iraq), Usha K. R. (India), Fabienne Kanor, (France), Alexandra Petrova (Russia), Ogochukwu Promise (Nigeria), and Milena Oda (Germany).

Author Selections

Usha K.R. (India): Excerpt from the novel The Chosen.

Milena Oda (Germany): Excerpt from the essay “Dog’s Freedom”

Naseer Hassan (Iraq): Poems from the collection Dayplaces.

Park Chansoon (S. Korea): Excerpt from the short story “Ladybugs Fly from the Top”

Ogochukwu Promise (Nigeria): Poems from the collections Madeba and Blazing Hope

Alexandra Petrova (Russian by birth, Italian national): Poems from the collections Residence Permit and Just the Trees.

Fabienne Kanor (France) (Read w/ Kecia Lynn): Excerpt from her novel Humus.

Author Bios

Usha K. R. (novelist, fiction writer, editor; India) is the author of four novels: Sojourn (1998), The Chosen (2003), A Girl and a River (2007), and Monkey-man (2010). Monkey-Man was long-listed for the 2010 Man Asian Literary Prize and was was shortlisted for the DSC South Asia Prize. Her essays and short stories have been featured in magazines, newspapers, collections and anthologies, including the Katha Prize Stories Volume 5. She occasionally reviews books for the Deccan Herald and is the managing editor of IIMB Management Review, in Bangalore. She participates courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

Milena ODA (fiction writer, playwright, translator; Germany) was born in Czechoslovakia and now works in Berlin as an editor, translator and journalist for Radio WDR, Der Freitag, Prager Zeitung, Literární noviny, and others. Her play Mehr als Meer was staged at the Central European Theatre Festival and at the 2009 Forum of Independent Theatre Groups in Alexandria. Oda is the recipient of the 2007 Marguerite d’Or in Vienna, and was nominated for the 2007 Ingeborg-Bachmann award. Her work, in German, Czech, and English, has been featured in the Entdeckungen 2. Cd/DVD Anthology, Ostragehege, Labyrint Revue, Lauter Niemand, Volltext, and Contact. In 2010 she published her first novel, Nennen Sie mich Diener [Please Call Me Servant].

Naseer HASSAN (poet, translator; Iraq) is the manager of a cultural NGO poetry forum, a producer at Free Iraq Radio, and an award-winning journalist. He has published four poetry collections, [The Circle of Sundial] (1998), [Suggested Signs] (2007), [Being Here] (2008) and Dayplaces (2010). In addition to his [Emily Dickinson: Selected Poems and Critical Articles] (2009), [Days of the Shore: Selections From the New American Poetry For the Period 1980-2010] (2011), and [Luis George Borges: 60 poems] (2011), he has several book-length translations forthcoming, including House of the Star: Robert Frost, Wallace Stevens, Langston Hughes, and the German philosopher Arthurs Schopenhauer’s philosophical work (The World as Will and Representation). His collected poems were published in 2010 by the Arabic House for Publishing in Beirut.

PARK Chan Soon (fiction writer, translator; South Korea) made her literary debut in 2006 after working as a film translator for dubbing and subtitling for thirty years, with over fifty documentaries and hundreds of feature films to her credit—including Robocop. She has also worked as a subtitler for film festivals, and translated a number of books for adults and children. She is the author of [Whisperings of a Translator – Movie Translation, Aesthetics of Communication] (2005); her first collection of short stories, [The Garden of Balhae] came out in 2009. She is a professor of English Literature at Seoul Women’s University.

Ogochukwu PROMISE (fiction writer, poet, essayist, playwright; Nigeria) is the founder and coordinator of the Lumina Foundation which instituted the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa; she also initiated the Get Africa Reading Project and runs a mobile library. Ogochukwu edits and publishes the literary magazine The Lumina, and the magazine Children’s Classic. An author of 16 novels, six collections of poetry, two short story collections, four plays, two essay collections, thirty children’s books, and editor of four literary collections, she has received seven Association of Nigerian Authors awards for her poetry and fiction. She participates courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

Alexandra PETROVA (poet, fiction writer; Russia/Italy) was born in Russia, lived in Jerusalem and currently resides in Rome. She is the author of three collections of poetry Линия Отрыва [Point of Detachment] (1994), Вид на жительство [Residence Permit] (2000), and Только деревья [Just the Trees] (2008). Her poems have appeared in Russian magazines: Znamia, Zvezda, and Zerkalo, in English in Literary Revue, Modern Poetry in Translation, Drunken Boat, Guernica, and many more. She has also written a play “Пастухи Долли” [Dolly's Shepherds, A Philosophical Play]. She was short listed for the Andrej Belyj award (2001, 2007) and she has received awards the “Migrante” European Poetry meeting (2006), Belgrade’s Festival of Poetry Trceg TRG (2008), and the Torino Festival’s Sixth Annual National Mother Language Literary Competition (2011). She is currently at work on her first novel. She participates courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

Fabienne KANOR (novelist, filmmaker; France) is the author of four novels, including Les Chiens ne font pas des chats (2008) and Anticorps (2010), as well as the children’s novel Le Jour où la mer a disparu (2008). She received the Fetkann Award for her novel D’Eaux Douces (2004), and the RFO Literary Award for Humus (2006). Kanor has also made a number of short documentaries and films, including C’est qui l’homme?, winner of the Best Screenplay Award at the Angers Film Festival in 2008. She has worked as a reporter at France 3, , Radio Nova (Paris), and International French Radio RFI. She is completing her fifth novel and a screenplay for the feature-length film Derriére le morne. She participates courtesy of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

On this Lit Show, Chuck Klosterman discusses his second novel, The Visible Man.

Victoria Vick is a therapist practicing in Austin, TX when she receives a call from a strange client, a man she refers to as “Y—.” He’s a [...]]]> Season 04
Episode 11
Air date: 11/9/2011, 2 PM CST

On this Lit Show, Chuck Klosterman discusses his second novel, The Visible Man.

Victoria Vick is a therapist practicing in Austin, TX when she receives a call from a strange client, a man she refers to as “Y—.” He’s a peculiar case, brilliant and self-deprecating, cantankerous and contrite. Strangest of all, he only wants to conduct sessions by phone. Gradually, he lets on that he’s a former government scientist gone rogue, and he’s unlocked the secrets to human invisibility. He spends his days watching people, holed up in their homes, unseen, relishing the secret lives of his “targets.”

“I’ve consumed people’s lives without their consent,” Y— confesses to Vicki. She listens to him share the stories of the many human glimpses he has stolen, vacillating between horror and fascination; even as Y—’s stories become more sinister and menacing, she struggles to let go. “Would I ever have a patient this interesting again?” she asks herself. “This was like being Hitler’s therapist, or Springsteen’s, or Superman’s.”

The novel, presented as a draft manuscript of a forthcoming work, is an epistolary narrative updated for the 21st century: we learn about Vicki and Y—’s ongoing therapy through voicemails, blackberry texts, recorded transcripts, typed notes, and email. The account that unfolds is a chilling account of modern voyeurism, an exploration of the Promethean powers of technology, and an attempt to navigate the terrain between our physical and virtual selves.

Chuck Klosterman is the New York Times bestselling author of seven books, including Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs and Eating the Dinosaur. His debut book, Fargo Rock City, was the winner of the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award. He has written for GQ, Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, Spin, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Believer, A.V. Club, and ESPN, and he now writes about sports and pop culture for Grantland.com.

Chuck Klosterman will read from and discuss The Visible Man at the Iowa City Public Library on Wednesday, November 9, beginning at 7 PM.

On this Lit Show, co-host Ben Mauk speaks with Colson Whitehead about his new novel, Zone One, a darkly satiric portrait of the coming zombie apocalypse.

Whitehead is the author of the novels Sag Harbor, Apex Hides the Hurt, John Henry [...]]]> Episode 09
Season 04
Air date: 11/2/2011, 2 PM CST

On this Lit Show, co-host Ben Mauk speaks with Colson Whitehead about his new novel, Zone One, a darkly satiric portrait of the coming zombie apocalypse.

Whitehead is the author of the novels Sag Harbor, Apex Hides the Hurt, John Henry Days, and The Intuitionist, as well as a book of essays, The Colossus of New York. He lives in pre-apocalypse New York City.

Whitehead’s reviews, essays, and fiction have appeared in the New York Times, The New Yorker, New York Magazine, Harper’s and Granta. He is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, a Whiting Writers Award, and a fellowship at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers.

Publishers Weekly says about Zone One: “Whitehead dumpster dives genre tropes, using what he wants and leaving the rest to rot, turning what could have been another zombie-pocalypse gore-fest into the kind of smart, funny, pop culture–filled tale that would make George Romero proud.”

Whitehead read at Prairie Lights on Friday, October 28th at 7 PM.

Susan Orlean’s new biography is an extraordinary book about an extraordinary animal. The German shepherd who became Rin Tin Tin was a puppy plucked from the ravaged battlegrounds of rural France during World War One. Through a series [...]]]> On this Lit Show, Susan Orlean discusses Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend.

Susan Orlean’s new biography is an extraordinary book about an extraordinary animal. The German shepherd who became Rin Tin Tin was a puppy plucked from the ravaged battlegrounds of rural France during World War One. Through a series of happy coincidences and the persistence of his discoverer, educator, and companion, Lee Duncan, Rinty became one of the world’s first A-list movie stars.

Orlean’s book is not only a canine coming-of-age story—it explores the complexities of modern mythmaking. At first, we follow the successes and setbacks of a dog-in-real-life, Rin Tin Tin, but gradually Rin’s physical presence dissolves into his media presence, diffusing like a drop of food coloring in water. The book is a powerful inquiry into the differences between life and life-on-film, as well as the poignant, problematic ways our cultural stories diverge from our biographical histories.

Susan Orlean is a staff writer at The New Yorker. She’s the author of many books on wide-ranging topics, including Saturday Night, a cultural history of Saturday night, and Red Sox and Bluefish, an exploration of what makes New England, “New England.” Her book The Orchid Thief was adapted into the Oscar-winning movie Adaptation, written by Charlie Kaufman. In addition to discussing Rin Tin Tin’s unlikely path to superstardom, Orlean addressed the surprising origins and history of the German shepherd breed, the reasons why we love watching animals on screen, and the strange twists and turns in her own life as a public figure.

This summer, students from the Iowa Young Writers’ Studio crowded into the KRUI studio to tell stories from memory. Without notes or written preparation, these high-schoolers gave oral histories—true-life tales they’ll hold inside their heads for a lifetime. The series was aired on four dates during a two-week period.

This program was inspired by 

This summer, students from the Iowa Young Writers’ Studio crowded into the KRUI studio to tell stories from memory. Without notes or written preparation, these high-schoolers gave oral histories—true-life tales they’ll hold inside their heads for a lifetime. The series was aired on four dates during a two-week period.

This program was inspired by The Moth Reading Series in New York City.

Listen to last year’s broadcast of this program (2010).

Note: Some students chose not to give their full names. Their names and hometowns are listed as they asked them to appear.

Part One: 6-21-2011

Ellie Kahn
Baltimore, MD
Stuck overnight at the Detroit Airport.

Emily Rekkia
Facing down bipolar disorder.

Harry
Pine Grove, PA
Rats attack.

Jake
Greenwich, CT
Reflections on a car accident.

Lauren
Philadelphia, PA
Backpacking for the first time.

Mike Ross
Minneapolis, MN
Mormonism through the eyes of an outsider.

Paris
Philadelphia,PA
Discovering Steinbeck, and mourning Lennie.

Sarah Gruner
Edgartown, MA
First love goes wrong.

Scott Broker
Colorado Springs, CO
When an underage friend gets dangerously drunk, disagreements about what to do.

Zoe
Scranton, PA
A nighttime Wal-Mart raid, fake moustaches included.

Part Two: 6-23-2011

Andy Chang
Corpus Christi, TX
The highs and lows of competitive swimming.

Anne-Sophie
Paris, France
Visiting Auschwitz.

Catherine
Brooklyn, NY
A mother’s fire of fire is passed down to her daughter.

Cole
Dallas, Texas
Losing best friends but becoming content with nerd status.

Danna
London, England
An encounter with anti-Muslim xenophobia in the United States.

Jenna
Kansas City, MO
Losing the spelling bee—on purpose.

Jonathan Hong
Seattle, WA
Learning to embrace a family dictum through a perplexing encounter with a panhandler.

Rosio
Des Plaines, IL
Coping with parental betrayal.

Sam
California
A brush with near-death on a mountain bike ride.

Sarah
Connecticut
Watching a friend grapple with severe anorexia.

Stephanie
Washington State
Worrying about a father’s alcoholism while away from home.

Part Three: 6-28-11

Due to technical difficulties, only a portion of this broadcast was recorded. 

Jess Clay
Trapping a possum by mistake. (Excerpt.)

Part Four: 6-30-2011

Abbey Schneider
New York, NY
Triumphs and trials on a solo camping trip.

Andrew Quintana
Miami, FL
In writing class, inappropriate attention from a much older man.

Catherine
California
The pain of losing touch.

Chloe
Reno, NV
Taking sheep for a ride.

Christine
San Jose, CA
Completely lost, with curfew hour approaching.

Dylan Combs
Greenville, SC
A favorite childhood place, blown up.

Ian
New Orleans, LA
Lost in the wilderness.

Mallika
Windham, NH
A boarding school community struggles with a student’s sudden death.

Nathan
Ohio
A Japanese hike, with leeches and waterfalls, doesn’t keep a friendship together.

Sarah
Lake Forest, IL
Building homes and helping kids in Memphis.

Stephanie Campbell,
Bettendorf, IA
Obscured vistas on a mountain hike.