I’m proud this month to present four selections in creative nonfiction that illuminate the human experience from several highly individualized and sometimes unique perspectives.In “Just Another Day,” KenDarian Carter illuminates for us certain realities regarding the experience of being black in America. The examples he has selected from his life are a testament to the long distance American society has yet to go in achieving understanding and equality.
In “Killing Trees,” Nahal Suzanne Jamir illuminates for us the realities of having a peripatetic upbringing. She takes us through Oklahoma, Texas, South Carolina, Wisconsin, and Florida, and the poetic descriptions her writer’s eye has chosen to give us dramatize what it means to be a person who is a survivor.
In “Meeting Time,” Jennifer (Eisenhauer) Richardson illuminates for us the realities of the life of a deceased man she has never met, her father-in-law, Doug. Her major resource in this endeavor are the letters Doug wrote to her husband. The essay is a moving tribute to what it means to understand people who are different from us.
Finally, in “Mr. Hemingway’s Leopard and I,” Philip Krummrich illuminates for us, in novel and interesting ways, the old trope of Hemingway’s leopard. Krummrich gives new meaning to the leopard motif by relating his own experiences of mountain-climbing in a locale very different and distant from any of Hemingway’s—Bolivia.
I am always interested in reading new work. I invite you to submit nonfiction on a topic of your choice. I’m looking for creative nonfiction, narrative nonfiction, memoirs, and personal essays—with the understanding that these categories often overlap—up to 10,000 words. Please submit work directly to me at [email protected]. I look forward to enjoying your work!