While some of our MFA students spent spring break in Canada and Portland, many stayed in Indy and were gifted with beautiful, sunny days in 70’s and even hotter evenings of exciting literary readings.

On Tuesday, Pressgang celebrated the release of Flashed: Sudden Stories in Comics and Prose, edited by Josh Neufeld & Sari Wilson. Butler MFA students read selections from the book before a conversational Q & A session with Neufeld and Pressgang’s Editor & Publisher, Robert Stapleton.

Flashed is a collection of flash fiction stories in comics and prose, pressed up against one another. In dialogue. In concert. In conversation. The stories are arranged in “triplets”—each grouping a kind of call-and-response among the respective contributors. So Flashed is more than an anthology; it’s a conversation among some of today’s most exciting prose writers and cartoonists, and between the forms of prose and comics.

On Wednesday, the Akbar III drew a crowd to the Brewpub. Emceed by Mindy Dunn and punctuated with impossible trivia by John Eckerd, the hotly-criticized and officially disavowed reading series packed the Brewpub’s sun porch once again.

The audience was treated to the debut reading from Ben Winter’s soon to be released novel, Underground Airlines. The Butler MFA professor and Edgar-winning author confessed he was nervous to read from his new novel, but the crowd was thrilled.  Butler MFA candidate Kyler Moor read his hilarious personal essay in the form of yelp reviews, and community poet Bree Jo’Ann entertained with poetry effectively funny and poignant at once.

Best lines from Akbar III:

Winters: I looked pathetic.

Kyler: Everyday has its asshole.

Bree: There was a time it was okay to be in a boy band.

John: Read a book people!

The sunny spring weather sparked interest among current MFA students in forming a hiking/outdoor writing group. With diverse natural landscape across Indiana – dunes to the north, caves to the south, rock formations to the west, and forests and hills all around us – there are many outdoor places near Indianapolis to explore and inspire. Look for details coming soon.

Get Back to MFA Life with These Events Happening This Week

Wednesday: Writing Club, 11:00, ECCW

Thursday: Visiting Writer Robin Coste Lewis Poetry Reading, 7:30 PM, Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall

Friday: Poetry Lunch Hour, 12:30, ECCW (RSVP to Mindy Dunn)

Friday: Sunset Story Hour storytelling slam, 7:00 PM, ECCW

Creative non-fiction candidate Andrea Boucher, who writes under the pen name A. Lyn Carol, won the inaugural blurred genre contest at Redivider.

Boucher emerged from over three hundred entries with her flash nonfiction piece “Eleven Signs My Bipolar Moods are Cycling.” Contest judge Jerald Walker writes, “the writer so deftly builds her character on the page that you root for her as you would a relative or good friend, hoping against all evidence that she will suddenly, miraculously, break free of her disease.”

Enjoy a teaser from her winning essay which will be published later this summer:

#1: I’m productive and smart, gregarious and charming, a regular Miss Slyboots with my zingy repartee. I can’t imagine ever being sad, and I’m convinced I’ve finally beaten bipolar.

Then the UPS man teases me about how many packages he’s been delivering, and shame tingles through me. This is the first sign, when I realize I’ve been fooled yet again. But I can’t stop buying vixen boots I’ll never wear and bejeweled bauble rings I hate. Sweaty and compulsive, I lie to cashiers about why I’m buying the same sweater in red, purple, blue, and green. My good mood sours. I’m irritable. No one moves, drives, or talks fast enough.

Boucher is not the only Butler MFA who is already celebrating in 2016. CNF Alumnus Gerry Justice has a personal essay on Linked in, and Fiction Alumnus Earl Carrender was recently published at 101 Words.

CNF candidate Susan Lerner’s essay, “What you Need to Feed Your Baby“,  was nominated for a Pushcart by Front Porch Journal. Poetry candidate Tracy Misken’s poem, “After the Mayo Clinic”, was nominated for a Pushcart by Parody Poetry Journal. Congratulations and best of luck!

Conversations@efryomson is a unique reading series designed to supplement the popular Delbrook Visiting Writers Series. All events occur in the home of the Butler MFA program, the Efroymson Center for Creative Writing. The series offers more intimate and interactive events than standard readings. We’ve had speakers from a wide range of genres and perspectives, including: screenwriting and documentary, blogging, graphic novels, book reviewing, editing, spiritual writing, poetry therapy, and more. The series also includes bimonthly poetry lunch discussions guided by Mindy Dunn. It is intended to enrich the literary “conversation” and community in the MFA program, on campus, and in the broader Indianapolis community. In addition to the poetry lunch hours, this semester’s line-up includes high energy events like yoga and creative writing, a story slam, an MFA career panel, and a writing for well-bring workshop. For more information contact Mindy Dunn.

The conversations@efryomson series kicks off the spring line up with Wordbending: the Yoga of Writing led by Emma Hudelson on Thursday, January 28th at 6:00pm. A description of the event is included below.

Yoga is mastery of the activities of the mind. Then the seer rests in its true nature. (Yoga Sutra 1.2-1.3)

Yoga isn’t really about bendy bodies in designer spandex. Yoga actually means “to yoke” or “to join,” and it is the practice of mastering the mind in order to arrive at truth. Whether we’re writing fiction, poetry, or nonfiction, we are using the mental tool of language, joining words together to create a meaningful truth, which makes writing a form of yoga. In this conversations@efro event, we will learn how to consciously use a yoga practice to enhance the writing process.

After a brief talk from MFA alum and yoga instructor Emma Hudelson, we’ll engage in a short, beginner-friendly practice of yoga breathing techniques and postures, then dive into a writing prompt. Wear comfortable workout clothing and bring a notebook or laptop. There will be a limited supply of yoga mats provided, but please bring your own if you have one.

Alumna Mel Coryell was named Indiana’s 2015-16 Milken Educator. The Milken Educator Awards honors top educators around the country with $25,000 unrestricted awards. The Milken Educator Awards targets early-to-mid career education professionals for their already impressive achievements and for the promise of what they will accomplish in the future.

Alumnus Kaveh Akbar read his poem,”Palmyra” on PBS Newshour. The poem, written in response to the beheading of Syrian archeologist Khaled Al-Asaadon, has also been featured at the Poetry Foundation and FSView. “This poem is an instance where I’m kind of cracking open the window and looking at, for as long as I can bear it, what is physically unbearable,” Akbar said.

The team from Pressgang (Butler’s small press) is celebrating the completion of FLASHED: Sudden Stories in Comics and Prose. The early buzz on this one is strong. NewPages reviewed the ARC in December and said that Flashed was “one of the most fun reading experiences” they had in 2015. To be released in February, Flashed is a unique, call-and-response collaboration between short fiction and comics. Contributors, including Junot Diaz, Lynda Barry, Aimee Bender and more, riff on each other’s work in curated triplets that begin to form an echo chamber on the creative process.

Our newest Creative Nonfiction student, Suzette Hackney wrote the powerful cover story for the Indianapolis Star’s Sunday Living section. The personal essay tells an emotional story of Hackney’s personal loss and her commitment to healthy living. Her essay has gained an outpouring of support and praise, including a tweet from John Green naming Hackney “Indianapolis’ brilliant newish columnist.”

Fiction candidate Elisabeth Giffin has had an outstandingly successful year in theater. First, she won Encore Association’s Best Major Supporting Actress in a Drama for her role in August: Osage County. Then, local theater critic, Ken Klingenmeier recognized Giffin with a “Mitty” (Most Impressive Theatre award).  She won “Most Impressive Actress in a Smaller Role” for her role in It’s A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play. Klingenmeier wrote, “Elisabeth Giffin showed a certain verve in her roles, creating feelings of both a carefree comic nature and, when necessary, feelings of distress and wantonness. And she did it all with what seemed to be an enviable effortlessness.” Giffin also landed a spot in a Lids commercial filmed in downtown Indy. If you haven’t seen it, check it out here.