The Big Conversation

Writing the Outdoors

Samaa Abdurraqib, Amy Leach, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Jeff VanderMeer discuss nature’s deep influence on their writing process. 

Imagined Selves

Kate Christensen has come to prefer fiction over memoir when it comes to writing about her life. 

Reading as a Form of Community Listening

Alison Turner works with unhoused and incarcerated writers in hopes of readers making time for their stories. 

The Lazy Writer’s Guide to World-Building

Elise LeSage has practical tips for creating new realities in far fewer pages. 

Know Thine Enemy

Recognizing the Tics and Tells of AI-Generated Content

Rebecca Cuthbert shares some red flags that a student’s creative writing might have come from AI. 

Advice for Memoirists Who Fear Having Their Lives Judged by Readers

Kristi Coulter traces reader backlash to avoidable missteps before and after publication. 

Too Much and Not Enough

Lisa Lee reconsiders childhood trips to Costco while crafting the characters of her debut novel. 

Unlikely Cocreator

Disability as an Expansive Force in Writing

Kate Crane, Petra Lord, and Addie Tsai talk about ways disability has shaped their relationships with writing. 

Lost in Adaptation

Meryl Branch-McTiernan contrasts writing her debut novel with her experience as a screenwriter, noting what books can lose when they become films. 

Writing for the Whole Person: Jesuit Creative Writing Pedagogy

SPONSORED POST

Alyse Knorr and Andrea Rexilius attribute the Mile-High Creative Writing Program’s success to the core Jesuit mission of service. 

Prompted

Lexi Rosen, Mitchell Nobis, and Heather Frese share favorite writing prompts in multiple genres. 

The Book of Marys and Glaciers

Carrie Olivia Adams

Tupelo Press 

Night Owl

Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Ecco 

The Temple Road: A Doctor’s Journey

Fazlur Rahman

Texas Tech University Press 

How to Plant a Billion Trees: A Memoir of Childhood Trauma and the Healing Power of Nature

Nicole Walker

Bloomsbury Academic 

What You Should Worry About

Meryl Branch-McTiernan

Akashic Books 

Good Company

Kate Christensen

Harper 

American Han

Lisa Lee

Algonquin Books 

2026 AWP George Garrett Award

Maw Shein Win, the 2026 winner, describes the importance of community and collaboration. 

2026 AWP Small Press Publisher Award

Obsidian’s Duriel E. Harris reflects on the journal’s first fifty years of supporting Black imagination. 

2026 AWP Writing Organization Award

CantoMundo director Belinda Acosta speaks about the organization’s mission to cultivate and claim space for Latinidad poets. 

Contests & Calls: Staff Selections

Ten listings from AWP’s Contests & Calls web page