Emerging Writers Festival Day 1

Co-sponsored by the English department and MFA program, the Emerging Writers Festival features two days of readings by five up-and-coming writers of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. On the second day of the festival, the authors hold a panel discussion on their experiences navigating life as a writer and the complexities of the publishing industry.

The Festival’s first day, April 12, will include readings from Abeer Hoque, Lucas Mann, and Sara Michas-Martin.

Abeer Hoque is a Nigerian-born Bangladeshi American writer and photographer. She is the author of three books: Olive Witch, a memoir; The Lovers and the Leavers, a collection of linked stories, photographs, and poems; and The Long Way Home, a coffee table book of travel photographs and poems. Her photographs have been featured in two solo exhibitions. Hoque has a degree from the University of Pennsylvania and is an alumna of the University of San Francisco’s MFA Program in writing.

Lucas Mann is the author of Class A: Baseball in the Middle of Everywhere, a 2013 Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, and Lord Fear: A Memoir, named one of the best books of 2015 by Kirkus Reviews. His essays and stories have appeared in Gawker, BuzzFeed, TriQuarterly,New South, Wigleaf, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. He has an MFA from the University of Iowa and is currently an assistant professor of English at The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

Sara Michas-Martin is the author of Gray Matter, which received the 2014 Poets Out Loud Prize. Other awards include a Wallace Stegner Fellowship and scholarships to the Bread Loaf and Squaw Valley Writers Conferences. Her poems and essays have appeared in The American Poetry Review, The Believer, Best New Poets, Denver Quarterly, Harvard Review, Threepenny Review, and elsewhere. She has taught at the University of Michigan, Goddard College, Stanford, and the Lighthouse Writers Workshop.