Education
MFA, Iowa Writers’ Workshop, University of Iowa
MFA, The Ohio State University
MA, Antioch University
BA, Anderson University
Teaching
At IUPUI
W206 Intro to Creative Writing (Poetry, Fiction, Nonfiction, Dramatic Writing)
W207 Intro to Fiction Writing
W301 Intermediate Fiction Writing
W302 Screenwriting
W401 Advanced Fiction Writing
W511 Fiction Writing for Graduate Students
Special Topics / Independent Studies: Playwriting, Nonfiction Writing, The Graphic Novel, The YA Novel, The Novella, Shakespeare & Creative Writing
At Previous Schools
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Dramatic Writing
Literature: 20th Century American, Drama, War, Sports
Literary Theory
Composition
Publications
Selected Publications
Books
Praying Drunk, 2014
(Italian edition: Mentre Cado, Ricordati di Me, tr. S. Bourlot, 2016)
In the Devil’s Territory, 2008
Selected Anthologies
“A Kidnapping in Koulev-Ville,” Best American Mystery Stories 2015
“Suspended,” Love & Profanity, 2015, and Best of Brevity, 2020
“Seven Stories about Sebastian of Koulev-Ville,” Best American Nonrequired Reading 2013
“A Day Meant to Do Less,” Best American Mystery Stories 2008
“Glossolalia,” HarperCollins Presents Forty Stories, 2008
“The Truth and All Its Ugly,” HarperCollins Presents Fifty-Two Stories, 2007 and Surreal South
“You Shall Go Out with Joy and Be Led Forth With Peace,” Twentysomething Essays by Twentysomething Writers: Random House’s Best Young Writers of 2006
Recent Journal Publications
“The Uber Diaries,” an essay, New Ohio Review
“Soldier,” a novella written collaboratively with James Yoder, Booth
“Mild Blue Dream,” a short story, Gulf Coast
“Amputation and the Angels,” a novella, Story Magazine
“The Secret to Happiness,” a novella, Missouri Review
“Notes on Harm Reduction,” an essay, Make Magazine Chicago
“Missions Week,” fiction, Arkansas International
“Night at the Fiestas,” an essay review, New York Times Book Review
Other Short Fiction, Essays, Etc. in Magazines and Literary Journals: Esquire, Salon, The Atlantic, Iowa Review, Gettysburg Review, Southern Review, Gulf Coast, Arts&Letters, Sou’wester, Ninth Letter, Mid American Review, Carolina Quarterly, Quarterly West, Iron Horse Literary Review, Bennington Review, Booth, Brevity, River Teeth, Redivider, Cream City Review, Barcelona Review, Arkansas International, New York Subway Stories, etc.
Short Film Production
“The Long Run,” Dir. Thomas Lewis, Pr. Kyle Minor, premiered at Heartland Film Festival Indy Shorts, 2021
“First of the Month,” Dir. Thomas Lewis, Wr. Kyle Minor, premiered at the Chicago International Film Festival for Social Change, 2020
“Shoulders” (Hillary Clinton Campaign Film), Dir. Linda Bloodworth-Thomason (served as consulting producer), 2016
Screenplays and Teleplays Commissioned or Currently Under Option
The Heart Mender/Island of the Saints ( adaptation)
Radio Quartet (original television pilot)
Awards
IAHI Collaborative Grant for Filmmaking
IU New Horizons Grant
Riley GMCHL Grant (participant / Jack Turman, PI)
CICF Grant (participant / Jack Turman, PI)
Indiana Humanities Grant (with Sarah Layden and Jason Aukerman)
OVCR RTR Grant
Story Prize Spotlight Award for Short Fiction
IPPY (Independent Publishers) Prize for Fiction
Iowa Review Fiction Prize
Best Short Story Collections of the 21st Century, Powell’s Books
Best of 2014 Lists: Flavorwire, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Amazon, Buzzfeed
American Booksellers Association Winter Institute Selection
The Rumpus Book Club Selection
Atlantic Monthly Contest, 2nd Place
Tara M. Kroger Award for Fiction
Academic Interests
Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Dramatic Writing
Form and Structure in the Concrete and the Abstract
20th Century American, World, Haitian, and Southern Literatures
Alice Munro, John Cheever, Edwidge Danticat, Joyelle McSweeney’s Necropastoral, mid-late career Roth, Katherine Anne Porter’s “Pale Horse, Pale Rider,” Frank Stanford, Howard Finster, Jean-Michel Basquiat
The Imaginary Intersection of the Broadway Musical and Dostoevsky’s Notes from a Dead House
Monsters and Floods
Narrative and Documentary Filmmaking
Literary Collaboration
American Jazz (1953-1970), The Territory Era of American Professional Wrestling, The Bounty Mutineers, Ice Hockey, Hiroshima
Interdisciplinary Engagements with Medicine & Public Health
Current Director, GMCHL Documentary Film Project at IU Fairbanks School of Public Health
