Join us as we celebrate the publication of Issue 42 of BLR and honor the winners of the 2022 BLR literary prizes. Step into spring with exciting new works of fiction, nonfiction and poetry, plus interviews by BLR editors Sarah Sala, Damon Tweedy, and Ronna Wineberg.

Read more about BLR and find copies of the journal at BLReview.org.

“IN MY HEAD” by AVRA ARON, Winner of the Felice Buckvar Prize for Nonfiction
Judged by Michele Harper

Avra will read from her winning essay and be in conversation with BLR nonfiction editor Damon Tweedy.

Avra Aron has been published in The Briar Cliff Review. That issue of Briar Cliff Review was listed as a Notable Special Issue by Best American Essays, 2019. She is currently working on a collection of essays.

"STEP-DOWN” by NITIN K. AHUJA, Winner of the Goldenberg Prize for Fiction
Judged by Amy Hempel

Nitin will read from his winning story and be in conversation with BLR fiction editor Ronna Wineberg.

Nitin K. Ahuja is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine in the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the University of Pennsylvania. His writing has previously appeared in Aeon, Slate, The Yale Review, The Washington Post, and The New England Journal of Medicine. He lives in Philadelphia.

"DROUGHT PASTORAL” by MICHAEL WEINSTEIN, Winner of the John & Eileen Allman Prize for Poetry
Judged by Crystal Valentine

Michael will read from his winning poem and be in conversation with BLR poetry editor Sarah Sala.

Michael M. Weinstein is a trans/crip poet and essayist whose work appears in Boston Review, Conjunctions, Narrative, the Kenyon Review, the Iowa Review, the Adroit Journal, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and the New Yorker. He holds an MFA from University of Michigan and a PhD from Harvard, and now lives in Tucson, Arizona.

With Readings by our Honorable Mention Winners

NONFICTION: “Casualty” by Emily Carter

Emily Carter writes nonfiction and prose poetry. A lifelong North Carolinian, she lives in the Southern Outer Banks with her Smokin’ Hot Love Biscuit, John, and her dog, Fergie. She contributes to Haunted Waters Press, Flying South, and NC Literary Review, and belongs to Carteret Writers, the Writers’ Exchange, and NC Writers’ Network.

FICTION: “Pale Unhappy Dog” by Angie Sijun Lou

Angie Sijun Lou is a Kundiman Fellow and a PhD candidate in Literature and Creative Writing at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her work has appeared in The American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, Poetry Northwest, FENCE, and The Asian American Literary Review. She lives in Oakland.

POETRY: “Six Weeks Into Chemotherapy” by Laura Paul Watson

Laura Paul Watson lives and writes in Pine, Colorado. She is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Florida. When not writing, she works as a general contractor. Her work has also appeared in Agni, Boulevard, and Poetry Ireland Review.