Writing

The Driftless Area

GWG Literary Prize | 2025

“3rd Place Winner of the International Geneva Writer’s Prize”

The Han Gan

“I was with my uncle that day at the Met when I first saw the Han Gan. He was not as taken as I by this scroll painting hung inside its Lucite box at the end of a room in the Asian galleries.”

“Dear Rena.
I know you will understand this letter because it is about everything. It’s homage to our talks—which are also about everything, the two-hour ones where we try to connect everything—to everything.
”

My Repeating World

“It went like this at the doctor’s office: He feels the cancer; he schedules an ultrasound, a biopsy, and a surgeon. Wow. Wow. You took a breath. You thought:”

Race This Race

Fourth Genre

“We are racing toward the airport. The rising sun glints off every stalk in the cornfield and makes an ocean foam out of the tassels. My partner, Doreen, is driving and I am sipping on tea...”

Reunion

Prism

“I went to a Catholic all-girl high school and I’m not sure what this has meant— what it offered then in terms of a foundation for who I am now. ”

The Olympic Oval

Fifth Wednesday Journal

“The truth now is that we are all hanging out at the Utah Olympic Oval. It is New Year’s Eve and my mother says it is like a dream come true for her. My nephew, her grandson, is a speed skater...”

The Drought Just Then

Rhino

“The CTA trains loomed close, and the dust came in. It added to the effect. The apartment was rather like a desert; the damp mattress, an oasis we lay on...”