The Loft Blog

Nicola Koh is a Malaysian Eurasian twelve years in the American Midwest, a Christian apostate with degrees from a Calvinist seminary, and a minor god of Tetris. They hold an MFA from Hamline University and were a 2018 VONA/Voices fellow in fiction.

Leah Christianson’s work has appeared in TriQuarterly, River Teeth, Storm Cellar Quarterly, and other publications. She earned an MFA at Miami University, where she was editor-in-chief of Oxford Magazine, received the Jordan Goodman Award in fiction, and taught composition and creative writing.

Trail of Lightning is set in the time after the Big Water, a climate catastrophe that has drowned most of the continent. It’s a world “where the old gods have risen, where monsters threaten the five-fingereds, where death stalks the few who still live on the land of their ancestors.”

Mishka Hoosen is a writer and teacher currently based in Cape Town, South Africa. He graduated from Interlochen Arts Academy in the US and received a masters in creative writing from Rhodes University in South Africa. His debut novel, Call it a Difficult Night, was published by Deep South Books.

Rachel Werner is faculty for Hugo House and The Loft Literary Center, a We Need Diverse Books program volunteer, and a book reviewer for Shelf Awareness. She is also the founder of The Little BookProject WI, a community arts and nonprofit biannual collaboration.

When she isn't writing, Christine Ma-Kellams teaches at San Jose State University. As a social psychologist whose empirical work deals with understanding the psychological motives behind individuals' behaviors, Ma-Kellams pairs the art of fiction with the science of what makes people ticks.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Certain Dark Things is about Atl, a vampire on the run in Mexico City, and Domingo, a teenager who lives on the streets and decides to help her. I’m interested in the way Atl is described, how the sequence of the details creates a dynamic—and magical—understanding of her.

Every post in this series will focus a weekly reading and a list of prompts in response to that reading. Some of them will be focused on craft; some will ask you to evaluate content. This week, we're examining the essay "My Father Spent 30 Years in Prison. Not He's Out." by Ashley C. Ford.

Every post in this series will focus a weekly reading and a list of prompts in response to that reading. Some of them will be focused on craft; some will ask you to evaluate content. This week, we're examining the story "The Flowers" by Alice Walker and the power of extended metaphor.

Yuri Herrera’s Signs Preceding the End of the World is the story of a woman crossing the border from Mexico to the United States in search of her brother. The novel is a study in unsettling the reader to create an experience that is frightening, beautiful, and astounding.

Every post in this series will focus a weekly reading and a list of prompts in response to that reading. Some of them will be focused on craft; some will ask you to evaluate content. This week, we're examining the poem "won't you celebrate with me" Lucille Clifton and calls to action.

Every post in this series will focus a weekly reading and a list of prompts in response to that reading. Some of them will be focused on craft; some will ask you to evaluate content. This week, we're examining the story "In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried" by Amy Hempel and writing death.