Bestselling authors R.O. Kwon and Garth Greenwell join PEN Out Loud to launch their dynamic anthology of short fiction, Kink: Stories. A singular collection that illustrates “love, desire, BDSM, and sexual kinks in all their glory,” Kink features some of contemporary fiction’s finest writers. The two editors of the anthology will be joined in conversation with contributors Melissa Febos and Brandon Taylor to discuss the book’s “moving dispatches from across the sexual spectrum.” BUY NOW ››
National Book Award finalist Brandon Hobson joins PEN Out Loud to celebrate his latest novel, The Removed. Weaving together multiple first-person narrators and Cherokee folklore, the novel tells the story of a Cherokee family 15 years after an unjust police shooting of one of the family’s three children. Hobson will be joined in conversation with Pulitzer Prize finalist Rebecca Makkai to discuss the novel and its “meditation on family, grief, home, and the power of stories.” BUY NOW ››
“Whatever life has in store, I move into this new year with less bitterness, and therefore more love, more life, in my heart because of your friendship.” —Ahmad Rahman
Madeleine L’Engle, author of A Wrinkle in Time, was one of PEN America's first Prison Writing Mentors, Her personal and literary connection with Ahmad Rahman, an incarcerated Black Panther leader & scholar, lives on in PEN America's L’Engle-Rahman Prize for Mentorship.
Join PEN America, the Dream Project, and Busboys and Poets for a virtual reading with the students and teaching artists of DREAMing Out Loud. Donauta Watson and Evelyn Cruz Santiago, alumni of the program, will perform their poetry alongside founder and award-winning Mexican novelist Álvaro Enrigue and Charlie Vázquez, a poet and novelist who formerly served as deputy chair of the Bronx Council on the Arts. Register here ››
The PEN Ten with Renée Watson: “Find your people. Writing is very isolating, and you will need one or two people to lean on, share work with. You will need them to cheer you on when you want to give up.”
The PEN Ten with Matthew Salesses: “A person’s identity and writing are negotiations with culture and power. Workshop is often an intense microcosm of this relationship.”
Join the Center for Black Literature for a conversation between Essence bestselling author Donna Hill with author Kalisha Buckhanon, about Hill's latest novel, Confessions in B-Flat. Register here ››
This six-week course, taught by Cinelle Barnes, editor of A Measure of Belonging: Twenty-One Writers of Color on the New American South, is intended for nonfiction writers of all levels seeking to begin or complete essays or memoirs that explore their relationship with a physical environment. Register here ››
In this class, taught by Nadia Owusu, author of Aftershocks, writers will bring a short excerpt of their work and, together, go through a layered revision process, paying attention to elements such as sensory detail, eliminating unnecessary words, the balance of summary and scene, and strengthening voice and point of view. Register here ››
