T191.
Minding the Gaps and Mining Landscape in Linked Short Story Collections
Thursday, March 9, 2023
1:45 pm to 3:00 pm
Linked short story collections have become more popular, perhaps in part because of their hybrid nature. They can employ recurring themes, characters, and settings to situate readers in worlds that move beyond the borders of many short stories while stopping short of the breadth and propulsion of a novel. Minding the gaps, or the spaces, is key in writing linked story collections. How does space function between and within linked collections, and what stories does one choose to tell and why?
Participants
Camille Acker grew up in Washington, DC. She holds a BA in English from Howard University and an MFA in creative writing from New Mexico State University. She is the author of the critically acclaimed short story collection, Training School for Negro Girls.
Ramona Reeves won the 2022 Drue Heinz Literature Prize for her linked story collection, It Falls Gently All Around and Other Stories. Her work has appeared in The Southampton Review, Bayou magazine, New South, Texas Highways, and others. She lives with her wife in Texas.
Leslie Pietrzyk is the author of Admit This to No One, Silver Girl, and This Angel on My Chest, a collection of short stories that won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize. She teaches fiction at the Converse College low-residency MFA program.
Rion Amilcar Scott is the author of story collections, The World Doesn't Require You and Insurrections, which won the 2017 PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction. He earned an MFA from George Mason University and teaches English at the University of Maryland.
Toni Ann Johnson won the 2021 Flannery O'Connor Award for her linked story collection Light Skin Gone to Waste. She is a 2015 NAACP Image Award nominee for her debut novel Remedy for a Broken Angel and a two-time winner of the Humanitas Prize for her screenplays Ruby Bridges and Crown Heights.
