the IOwa review

“The Velvet Underground & Nico,” Iowa Review Award (Nonfiction) runner-up

“I read 'The Velvet Underground & Nico' in the same way I once listened to my favorite albums: moving through the essay in order at first, and then returning to individual tracks, or sections, for their story but also for the experience of a specific mood. This essay is both startlingly new and utterly humane, one I am sure I will return to for years to come.” — Sarah Viren, judge  

CRAFT

“What I Do and Don’t Remember From the Days and Night of Endlessly Smoking Crack and Shooting Heroin,” CRAFT Creative Nonfiction Award, judged by Ingrid Rojas Contreras, Best of the Net and Pushcart Prize nominated

“‘What I Do and Don’t Remember from the Days and Nights of Endlessly Smoking Crack and Shooting Heroin’” is gritty, feverish, electric. What ensues from its title is a narrative of addiction in list form. The essay’s candor is scalding. The nightmarish harshness of trying to quit, while being under the hold of addiction, is told as if under fluorescent light. There’s using alone, and using with Haley, the essay tells us at its opening. The narrative itself is moving, haunting, as we follow the two in a spiraling bender while still trying to gain a foothold in sobriety. This essay is ferociously intense.” — Ingrid Rojas Contreras, judge