Writers Make Top Sci-Fi, Fantasy List
Five writers from NC State’s MFA in Creative Writing Program are receiving recognition for their work in science fiction and fantasy.
Editors of the Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy series selected stories from one MFA student, three alumni and one faculty member to its latest list of notable stories.
The annual series is led by award-winning editor John Joseph Adams, who selects the top 80 works in fiction and nonfiction from hundreds of magazines, journals and websites. A guest editor — this year author Karen Joy Fowler — then picks the 20 best pieces to publish in an anthology.
Alum and three-time Nebula Award-winner Kij Johnson (MFA ‘12) will appear in the anthology for her story, The Apartment Dweller’s Bestiary. Other writers included on the list of notable stories are:
- John Kessel (MFA faculty), Consolation
- Helena Bell (MFA ‘15), When We Were Giants
- Julie Steinbacher (MFA ‘16), Chimeras
- Alyssa Wong (MFA ‘17), Hungry Daughters of Starving Mothers. Wong won a 2015 Nebula Award for the same story.
The only degree program of its kind in the region, NC State’s MFA in Creative Writing — with specialization in either poetry or fiction — is a two-year program of workshops, literature courses and electives, culminating in a final thesis of literary work worthy of publication.
The program, led by an award-winning faculty of poets and novelists, has been home to a long list of acclaimed writers. Alumni include novelists William Conescu (Being Written and Kara Was Here) and Therese Fowler, whose New York Times bestselling novel Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald is being adapted into a new TV series. Other alums include poets Michael Begnal (Ancestor Worship and Future Blues), Noel Crook (Salt Moon), Celeste Doaks (Cornrows and Cornfields) and Megan Roberts (Matters of Record).
