M.F.A. Students

Alex Baker (Third Year, Nonfiction) was born and raised in the Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco. She studied sustainable food systems and creative writing in New York and is interested in exploring the intersection of health and community. She has been living in coastal Maine for many years, and much of her writing stems from experiences within these communities. She aims to write about personal and collective health as well as relationships that are tethered to aquatic landscapes.

North Bennett (First Year, Nonfiction) grew up in Bellingham, Washington. He attended Whitman College, where he studied Environmental Humanities. North is interested in posthumanism, flat ontologies, and how written works attempt to understand the climate crisis. Before coming to the University of Idaho, he lived on the edges of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. His writing has appeared on Mangoprism, the For the Love of Climbing podcast, and in The Climbing Zine.

Paul Bisagni (Third Year, Poetry) is from Long Island, New York, but has also lived in Tucson, Bulgaria, D.C., and rural Ohio. His poems can be found in TIMBER, Guesthouse, Afternoon Visitor, Heavy Feather Review, Harpur Palate, SLFFCK, Dream Pop, and on the Action Books blog. He is a lapsed classicist and former ESL teacher.

Georgia Cloepfil (Third Year, Nonfiction) was born and raised in Portland, Oregon. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Joyland, n+1, Epiphany and Redivider, among others, and has been featured on Longreads, The Rumpus, and WBUR Boston’s Only a Game. She won the Epiphany Breakout 8 Writers Prize in 2020. Prior to enrolling at the University of Idaho, she played professional soccer for 5 years.

Crystal Cox (First Year, Poetry) is from Columbia, Missouri. She is a graduate of the University of Missouri, where she studied English, journalism, and women’s and gender studies. Her hobbies include hiking, gardening, and visiting antique stores. Prior to the University of Idaho, Crystal worked as a barista and as a publishing intern for Persea Books.

Libby Croce (Second Year, Poetry) was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She attended Knox College, where she studied English and Creative Writing. She is currently the Marketing Editor for Fugue.

Neil Davidson (Third Year, Fiction) is a writer from Oregon. He has a B.A. from the University of Oregon and an M.A. in English from the University of California, Davis. His fiction appears in anthologies by Scary Dairy Press, Browncoat Press, and Gnashing Teeth Press. He is the 2021-2022 Hemingway Fellow at the University of Idaho. A former cook, he is working on a novel about gentrification and the food service industry.

Cady Favazzo (Third Year, Poetry) was born and raised in Wyoming, where she studied education and worked as a first grade teacher. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Columbia Review, Phoebe, The Shore, and elsewhere. She is the winner of the 2021 Five South Poetry Prize.

Joely Fitch (Third Year, Poetry) is writing and thinking about infinity. She is also the current editor-in-chief of Fugue. Her recent work appears in The Shore, Voicemail Poems, HAD, and Dilettante Army.

Laur A. Freymiller (Second Year, Fiction) was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, educated in Minnesota, and cultivated in California. They studied ecology and evolutionary biology at Carleton College and use short stories to continue their investigations. Laur’s stories have been published in Entropy Magazine, The Fabulist, Hobart, and Nightmare Magazine. Laur loves fairy tales, flightless birds, and their cat, Scout.

Michael Harper (First Year, Fiction) completed his MA in English at the University of Vienna. His work has appeared in The Manzano Mountain Review, Litro Magazine, Decomp Journal, and CafeLit. Prior to the University of Idaho, he taught English as a second language in Europe.

Natalie Kinkade (First Year, Nonfiction) was born and raised in Bend, Oregon. She writes about art, religion, depression, roadside Americana, and childhood, among other things. Her work has appeared in Gulf Coast and is forthcoming in The Rumpus. Before attending the University of Idaho, she earned an M.A. in English from Ohio University. She lives in Moscow, Idaho, with her puppy, Pippin.

Courtney Lucas (Third Year, Fiction) is from Pikeville, Kentucky, and graduated from Centre College. She has been published in Still the Journal and has completed a short story cycle set in Eastern Kentucky. Her current projects include a choose-your-own-adventure novel and a story cycle set in a hotel. Her work confronts Appalachian stereotypes while exploring the ways stories can be told. She enjoys camping, photography, bullet journaling, pop punk, and Animal Crossing.

Daniel Lurie (First Year, Poetry) was born and raised in Talala, Oklahoma. He attended Montana State University, where he studied Organizational Communications. His work has appeared in The Palouse Review, FeverDream, and The Rook, and he has a forthcoming poem titled “One Night Only,” which will be stamped into a concrete street in Billings, Montana, through Sidewalk Poetry. Daniel wants to become a published environmental activist.

Isabel Marlens (First Year, Nonfiction) grew up in California and Colorado, and studied literature and ecology & evolution at Bennington College. She went on to work in the nonprofit world, writing about local economies and initiatives for community and ecological renewal. She is working on essays that layer the personal with thoughts on literature, psychology, evolutionary theory, history, and politics. She spends most of her free time rock climbing and traversing the rural West.

Cameron Martin (First Year, Poetry) is a fat and queer essayist and poet originally from Michigan. He attended Wayne State University and the University of Ida- ho, where he studied English. Their writing has appeared in Sonora Review, The Normal School, Palette Poetry, and Afternoon Visitor. He’s currently working on collections of poetry and personal essays. In Moscow, they are one of the co-coordinators of the ‘queer-minded, queer-hearted’ Pop-Up Prose reading series.

Afton Montgomery (Second Year, Nonfiction) writes on inheritance, girlhood, and the multiplicity of self. She was selected by Vi Khi Nao as the prose winner of the 2021 Mountain West Writers’ Contest at Western Humanities Review and was a finalist for the Pinch Literary Awards in nonfiction in 2018. Afton is the Managing Editor for Fugue. She was formerly the frontlist buyer at Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver. She calls Colorado home.

Milo R. Muise (Third Year, Nonfiction) is a trans poet and essayist. They hold a BA from Hampshire College where they studied creative writing, queer studies, and psychoanalysis. The recipient of a 2018 Oregon Literary Fellowship in poetry and winner of the 2021 Newfound Prose Prize, Milo’s work has appeared in Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Hobart, Prelude, Tinderbox, and elsewhere.

Emma Neal (First Year, Fiction) was born and raised in Boise, Idaho. She attended Sarah Lawrence College, where she studied creative writing and religion. Currently, she is working on a collection of short stories about young women trying to understand themselves and searching for their communities. Emma enjoys coffee shops, live music, and painting. She taught yoga for two years at Sarah Lawrence College.

Christian Perry (First Year, Nonfiction) is a white, Queer, Midwesterner born and raised in Michigan. They attended Michigan State University, where they studied a myriad of subjects and obtained a BA in English/Creative Writing in 2019. In 2020, Christian self-published their undergraduate thesis, thanks. Their free time is often spent playing Nintendo games and going on long walks.

Clare Shearer (Third Year, Nonfiction) has had work appear in Issue Magazine and the Los Angeles Review of Books, and she has received support from the New York State Summer Writers Institute and the Anderson Center. She was 2020-21 co-Editor-in Chief of Fugue.

Sam Simmons (First Year, Fiction) is a writer from California. He attended the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he studied literature. He is currently at work on a novel.

Steff Sirois (First Year, Fiction) is from Cheshire, Connecticut. She earned her B.A. in English from Southern Connecticut State University, where she finally got the chance to indulge in her passion for writing prose. The last big project she worked on was a collection of short stories for her undergraduate honors thesis called Where They Want You, which was inspired by her experiences as a woman working in the service industry.

Gianna Stoddard (Second Year, Nonfiction) was raised on an avocado orchard in Southern California and studied at UC Santa Barbara’s College for Creative Studies. Their work engages with the semi-fluid boundaries between the body and its environments—between the natural and the unnatural, the human and the nonhuman—as well as quiet moments of queer intimacy, domesticity, and joy. Gianna is a dedicated cook and enjoys hiking, backpacking, and outdoor swimming.

Abigail Wotton (Third Year, Fiction) attended Bridgewater State University for her undergraduate degree in English and Creative Writing and her MA in English Literature. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in 805 Lit & Art and The Pinch. Her short story “Telling The Bees” was a 2018 honorable mention in Glimmer Trains’ short story contest for new writers and her story “I am The Real Gecko” was nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story prize for new writers.

2021 Graduates:

Michael Bishop, M.F.A. Nonfiction

Scott Dorsch, M.F.A. Fiction

Zach Eddy, M.F.A. Poetry

Court N. Fund, M.F.A. Poetry

Louie Land, M.F.A. Fiction.

Steven Pfau, M.F.A. Nonfiction

Sean Theodore Stewart, M.F.A. Fiction

Rob Thornton, M.F.A. Poetry

2020 Graduates:

Ryan Downum, M.F.A. Poetry

Stephanie Hamilton, M.F.A. Fiction

Ben Avi Shane, M.F.A. Fiction

Keene Short, M.F.A. Nonfiction

Sarah VanGundy, M.F.A. Nonfiction

2019 Graduates:

Caitlyn Curran, M.F.A. Poetry

Shane Dominguez, M.F.A. Fiction

CMarie Fuhrman, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

Caitlin Hill, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

Jack Hill, M.F.A. Fiction

Stacy Boe Miller, M.F.A. Poetry

Caitlin Palmer, M.F.A. Fiction

Jacob Wilson, M.F.A. Fiction

Lauren Yarnall, M.F.A. Poetry

2018 Graduates:

Samantha Burns, M.F.A. Fiction

Tara Howe, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

Kat Lewis, M.F.A. Poetry

Grant Maierhofer, M.F.A Fiction

Cameron McGill, M.F.A. Poetry

Corey Oglesby, M.F.A. Poetry

Lauren Westerfield, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

2017 Graduates:

Jerri Benson, M.F.A. Fiction

Garrett Lee Chavis, M.F.A. Poetry

Jordan Clapper, M.F.A. Fiction

Ash Goedker, M.F.A. Poetry

Caroline Hall, M.F.A. Fiction

Ross Hargreaves, M.F.A. Fiction

J. Hamilton, M.F.A. Fiction

Canese Jarboe, M.F.A. Poetry

Jason Mastaler, M.F.A. Poetry

Jason Sarna, M.F.A. Fiction

Karl Utermohlen, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

Paul Warmbier, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

Sally Yazwinksi, M.F.A. Fiction

Laura Zak, M.F.A. Creative Nonfiction

2016 Graduates:

Myles Barker, M.F.A. Fiction

Sarah Barrett, M.F.A. Fiction

Nathaniel Brown, M.F.A. Fiction

Lane Culton, M.F.A. Fiction

Michelle Cushing, M.F.A. Fiction

Jordan Durham, M.F.A. Poetry

Max Eberts, M.F.A. Fiction

Misty Ellingburg, M.F.A. Fiction

Nathan Fisher, M.F.A. Poetry

Ryan Kalis, M.F.A. Fiction

Courtney Kersten, M.F.A. Nonfiction

Michael Landreth, M.F.A. Poetry

Jamie Lyon, M.F.A. Fiction

Jessica McDermott, M.F.A. Nonfiction

Joseph Perreault, M.F.A. Fiction

Zana Previti, M.F.A. Poetry

Melanie Thongs, M.F.A. Nonfiction