EXCITING NEWS & UPDATES FROM SPALDING'S NASLUND-MANN SCHOOL OF WRITING STUDENTS, ALUMNI, FACULTY & STAFF
Students
Colleen Alles’s (P) middle school novel, The Hound of Thornfield High, was released as an audiobook last month. You can access the book, a contemporary retelling of Jane Eyre, on Audible.
Amy Cornell (F) was recently published by The Hemlock Journal. Read her short story, “The Poetry Thief,” in their summer 2024 issue.
Ben Swindler (F/SW) is a dad, husband, writer, IT professional, and soccer coach. He is currently pursuing his MFA at the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding. His residency assignment, “Verde River,” was recently published by Nunum.
Faculty & Staff
Dianne Aprile (CNF faculty) has been selected to lead writing workshops in the coming year for visitors to the Parklands of Floyds Fork, Louisville’s 4,000-acre park. Participants will write from prompts and exercises based on walking and observing the natural beauty of the Parklands' paths, including the Poetry Trail, a project Dianne helped get off the ground.
On September 6, Debra Kang Dean (poetry faculty) was part of the Etheridge Knight Poetry Reading, which took place outside the Chatterbox Jazz Club in Indianapolis. She, Allyson Horton, and Norman Minnick each read a few of Knight’s poems and a few of their own.
The event, organized by the Center for Citizenship and Community at Butler University and the EKFreePeoplesBe project, was funded in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
On behalf of Naslund-Mann and Spalding University at large, Kathleen Driskell, Chair, happily welcomed two literary groups to the Troutman Lectorium: on September 21, the first Kentuckiana Youth Poet, Milo Harvey, was named to represent our region; on October 1, Spalding partnered with the James Baker Hall Foundation to celebrate the first James Baker Hall Book Award and its winner, Wesley Houp. Poetry faculty member Greg Pape judged the poetry book competition, and Accents Publishing, headed up by our poetry alum Katerina Stoykova, will publish Houp's debut collection of poems. Kathleen has three poems coming out soon in Still: The Journal. The poems will be collected in Goat-Footed Gods, her sixth collection, out in March from Carnegie Mellon University Press. She recently participated in the Spirit of Sophia “Women Create” program, which collects work by women artists each year. Kathleen will be present at the Naslund-Mann table at the Louisville Book Fair on October 19, and she presents “Find Your Writing Life,” an information session happening in the Writer’s Room (sponsored by Naslund-Mann) at the Kentucky Book Festival on November 2 in Lexington.
Lynnell Edwards (Associate Programs Director, poetry faculty) has had a busy fall doing events with her new collection The Bearable Slant of Light, including conversations with her colleague in the psychology department at Spalding, Dr. Steve Katsikas, for the September Wellness Wednesday conversation at the Monarch in Louisville and for a member event with the National Alliance for Mental Illness in October. She has also given readings at Morgenstern’s Books in Bloomington, Indiana, with Spalding poetry alum Nancy Chen Long and at Coffee Tree Books in Morehead, Kentucky. More events are planned in the coming year; keep up with her at lynnelledwards.com.
Roy Hoffman (fiction and CNF faculty), who judged the category of best novel of the year by a Mississippi author for the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters, selected Jesmyn Ward’s Let Us Descend. For the Alabama Humanities Alliance magazine, Mosaic, published this fall, Roy wrote the lead essay on the power of story. In September, traveling to Lisbon and Porto as a faculty member with alumni and students of Spalding’s Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing, in a literary and cultural enrichment trip through Portugal, Roy gave a lecture on travel writing, and with colleague Katy Yocom led a group discussion of the mercurial Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa. In a “happy hour” presentation, Roy discussed his novel The Promise of the Pelican, and Katy her novel Three Ways to Disappear, in terms of how they were inspired by foreign cultures in their creative writing, and how others might look to far-off journeys as a way of nurturing their own work.
Erin Keane (CNF/P faculty) was in conversation with author David Daley on October 3 about his new book, Antidemocratic: Inside the Far Right’s 50-Year Plot to Control American Elections at Carmichael’s Bookstore in Louisville. In her capacity as a member of the Sarabande Books board of directors, Erin appeared onstage introducing special guests at the Poetry Carnival in September, part of the independent literary press’s year-long celebration of its 30th anniversary. On October 18, she will speak about research methods in creative nonfiction on a panel at the Louisville Book Festival. And over the summer, a long-form reported essay, “Navigating the New Sober Boom,” written by New York Times bestselling author D. Watkins and published by Salon, where Erin is chief content officer, won a James Beard Award for Journalism.
Robin Lippincott's (F/CNF faculty) flash fiction piece, "The Road We Live On," will appear in the Fall 2024 edition of Still: The Journal. Also, Robin is serving as Guest Fiction Editor for the Spring 2025 issue of The Louisville Review.
Karen Mann (administrative director) recently joined a writer’s group where she is getting to know local writers. Karen belongs to four book clubs and is excited that the selection for one of them in November is Solito by Javier Zamora, who is the fall residency Distinguished Visiting Writer and the winner of the 2024 Spalding Prize for the Promotion of Peace and Justice in Literature. Karen plans to have lunch with some Spalding alums who also live in Colorado on October 19.
Karen Salyer McElmurray’s (F/CNF faculty) new essay collection, I Could Name God in Twelve Ways, was recently published by the University Press of Kentucky. She was recently interviewed in Hippocampus.
Lesléa Newman (W4CYA faculty) talks about all things writing in this interview with Jonathan Rosen of The Jewish Lens. Her poem, "At the Jerusalem Café" was recently published as part of the Jewish Book Council Witnessing Series. And Leslea’s newest book, Hanukkah, part of a series of holiday books, was just published by Quarto Books. Meet Lior and learn how he and his family celebrate the Eight-Day Festival of Lights.
Bruce Marshall Romans (writing for TV, screen, and stage faculty) has a true crime drama, “The Thing about Tommy,”in development with Peacock TV.
Maggie Smith (P faculty) is guest judge for the 2025 Marvin Bell Memorial Poetry Prize, sponsored by December Magazine. Submissions are open through November 1.
Keith S. Wilson (P faculty) is a winner of the 2024 National Poetry Series competition with his collection Games for Children, which will be published by Milkweed Editions. He was also selected as an Artistic Practitioner Fellow of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America at Brown University.
Katy Yocom (Associate Director, F ’03) led a group of alumni and students to Portugal in late September with faculty member Roy Hoffman. With Roy, she led a group discussion of the book in common, Fernando Pessoa & Co: Selected Poems, and a “happy hour” conversation about their respective novels (The Promise of the Pelican for Roy and Three Ways to Disappear for Katy), both of which involve cultures other than their own. The group met with two American ex-pats, including alum David Hassler (F ’05), and visited the gorgeous Poet’s Park outside Lisbon, among other activities.
Alumni
Lynda Archer (F '05) has published a third First Person essay with Canada’s national newspaper, the Globe and Mail. The essay describes her journey with aging as she and her wife move from a beloved house and gardens into a retirement home, which they soon discover to be an enclave of artists: writers, painters, knitters, woodworkers, and sewers of beautiful rugs and quilts. Lynda's essay details the delights of living in such a creative community. She will include this piece in her collection of essays she plans to publish.
Avitus B. Carle’s (F'16) debut flash fiction collection, These Worn Bodies, was the winner of the 2023 Moon City Press Short Fiction Award and will be published on November 1, 2024. The collection consists of short-short stories (all 1,000 words or less in length), presenting in a variety of forms including a single sentence, crossword puzzle, legal documents, and a resume.
Rick Childers’s (F '22) debut novel, Turkeyfoot, was published in September by Shotgun Honey Books. Turkeyfootgrapples with themes of addiction, abuse, and family ties set in an Appalachian community drowning amid the opioid crisis. As the influx of fentanyl begins to take its toll, young Lucy Perley is forced to take on more than any child should have to. The book is already receiving favorable reviews. Silas House wrote, “Rick Childers’ love for Appalachia shows clearly in his insistence on showing its joys, sorrows, and complications.” And author David Joy wrote, “A story of place richly imagined, Turkeyfoot ties together a cast of characters fully fleshed and deeply scarred.”
Cheré Coen (F ’23) was elected newsletter editor of Novelists, Inc. (NINC) and is now a member of the organization's board. Her work-in-progress, which she workshopped while at Spalding, was chosen to be read at the recent Novelists Inc. convention in Florida. Her essay on witches in literature, also created at Spalding, will appear in the October newsletter of NINC.
Kelly Creagh’s (W4CYA ’08) young adult romantasy, A Promise to Hades, will be published by Viking Children’s in 2026.
Farah Faye (CNF '17) curates the Scrappy Reading Series based in Brooklyn, New York. The reading series brings together emerging and established authors (like Chloé Caldwell, Lilly Dancyger, Deborah Copaken, and Gina Chung) to explore what it means to be scrappy. This highly successful series is sponsored by the Brooklyn Public Library and has sold out each time! Many more events to follow!
Mary Sophie Filicetti (F ’24) co-authored the children’s book Five Fabulous Insects for American Printing House’s Building on Patterns Braille curriculum for kindergarten students.
Anne Marie Fowler’s (P ’04) poem, “A New Wife’s Response to the First Act,” was recently published in Black Fox Literary Magazine.
Nancy Chen Long (P ’12) read at Proof: A Midwest Lit Fest in October. The festival was sponsored by Indiana Humanities.
Brett Neveu was recently appointed Assistant Professor in the department of Radio/Television/Film at Northwestern University.
Tanya Robie (F ‘09) and Darlene Van De Grift are thrilled to announce they signed their debut novel, EarthBound; The Genesis of the Great Experiment, with Pegasus Publishing House! Channeled by a world-renowned medical medium (Darlene), and transformed into an epic journey by Tanya, EarthBound is a multidimensional memoir that, through the wild adventures of one soul’s many lifetimes, offers profound spiritual teachings and skillful practices to help humanity remember, awaken and heal the wholeness of who we are to save the world, now. Likely to be released in early 2026, it’s the first in a series of five. Deep gratitude to K.L. Cook and Eleanor Morse for their extraordinary mentorship that helped prepare Tanya for the massive undertaking of this series.
Leslie Santamaria (W4CYA ’22) sold her middle-grade novel, Moon Girl, to Charlesbridge Moves for publication in Spring 2027. A portion of the mystery novel was her creative thesis, and she is grateful to her mentors and fellow students for their valuable input and support. Connect with her on X @LSSantamaria, on Instagram @santamaria_leslie,or on her website, lesliesantamaria.com.
Mervyn Seivwright (P ’19) won The Caribbean Writer’s Marvin E. Williams Literary Prize for his poem, “Senses I Recalled a Decade Ago.”
Maria Steinmetz (W4CYA '14) had her poem "Ariadne Wonders" published by Ember: A Journal of Luminous Things in October 2024.
Michelle Tyrene Johnson’s (PW/SW ’22) play “Horse Power: Tom Bass’ American Story” had its world premiere in Kansas City, Missouri. The play was co-produced by American Royal Association and Coterie Theatre.