Visiting Writers Series

Mesha Maren, a graduate of UNCA, is the author of the novels Sugar Run and Perpetual West. Her short stories and essays can be read in Tin House, The Oxford American, The Guardian, Crazyhorse, Triquarterly, The Southern Review,and elsewhere. She is an Associate Professor of the Practice of English at Duke University.

Kayla Min Andrews teaches English to international students and is working on a novel about a mother-daughter relationship.

Natalie Baszile’s debut novel, Queen Sugar, is a mother-daughter story of reinvention—about an African American woman who unexpectedly inherits a sugarcane farm in Louisiana. Queen Sugar was adapted into a critically acclaimed television series directed by Ava Duvernay. Baszile’s most recent book, We Are Each Other’s Harvest, is an exploration and celebration of black farming in America. 

Neema Avashia’s memoir, Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place, examines both the roots and the resonance of Avashia’s identity as a queer desi Appalachian woman. She was born and raised in southern West Virginia to parents who immigrated to the United States. Her essays have appeared in the Bitter Southerner, Catapult, Kenyon Review Online, and elsewhere.