Grand Valley Writers Series
The Grand Valley Writers Series has a long history of bringing distinguished and emerging writers to campus to read from their work, visit classes, and interact with students across GVSU's campus. In past years, the Grand Valley Writers Series has been proud to host a dynamic and diverse range of writers on campus including Traci Brimhall, Jericho Brown, Peter Ho Davies, Tarfia Faizullah, Jamaal May, Roxane Gay, Claire Vaye Watkins, Derek Palacio, Maggie Smith, Amina Gautier, Dinty W. Moore, Claudia Rankine, David Shields, Vievee Francis, Matthew Olzmann, and many others.
Grand Valley Writers Series 2026-2027
Katie Jean Shinkle
Thursday, October 1, 2026
Craft Talk: 4p - 5:15p, LOH 178
Reading and Q+A: 6p - 7:15p, Library Multi-Purpose Room (LIB 030)
Katie Jean Shinkle (GVSU Writing alum, 2007) is the author of five books and 10 chapbooks, including The Only Way Out is Through (YesYes Books, 2026), Transference (Gasher Press, 2025), and Tannery Bay (coauthored with Steven Dunn, FC2, 2024). She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Alabama, a PhD in Creative Writing and Literary Arts from the University of Denver, and is an associate professor of creative writing and Director of the MFA in Creative Writing, Editing, and Publishing program at Sam Houston State University.
Curtis Chin
Wednesday, October 28, 2026
Reading and Q+A: 1:30p - 2:45p, KC 2204
Curtis Chin is the author of the award-winning memoir, Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant, the 2025-26 Great Michigan Read, a 2024 Michigan Notable Book, and an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book—Israel Fishman Nonfiction Award. A co-founder of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop in New York City, Curtis Chin served as the nonprofit's first Executive Director. He went on to write comedy for network and cable television before transitioning to social justice documentaries. Chin has screened his films at over 600 venues in twenty countries. He has written for CNN, Bon Appétit, the Detroit Free Press, and the Emancipator/Boston Globe.
A graduate of the University of Michigan, Chin has received awards from ABC/Disney Television, New York Foundation for the Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, and more. His essay in Bon Appétit was just selected for Best Food Writing in America 2023, and his short doc, "Dear Corky," premiered on American Masters (PBS). He is currently working on a new Chinese Restaurant project.
Curtis Chin
This event is made possible in part by a grant from Michigan Humanities, an affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Additional support is provided by national, statewide, and local partners, including the Library of Michigan and MSU Federal Credit Union.
GVSU Faculty Reading
Sasha Debevec-McKenney & Jane Morton
Wednesday, February 3, 2027
Reading and Q+A: 4:30p - 5:45p, venue TBA
Sasha Debevec-McKenney is the author of the poetry collection Joy Is My Middle Name (Fitzcarraldo Editions and W.W. Norton, 2025), winner of the 2026 Dylan Thomas Prize. She teaches poetry and creative writing at Grand Valley. Sasha received her MFA from New York University, was the 2020–2021 Jay C. and Ruth Halls Poetry Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, and a 2023-2025 Creative Writing Fellow at Emory University. Her poems have appeared in places like The New Yorker, The Yale Review, The Drift, and Granta. She was born in Hartford, Connecticut.
Jane Morton is the author of Shedding Season (Black Lawrence Press) and Snake Lore (Black Lawrence Press). Their individual poems and short fiction can be found in literary journals including West Branch, Gulf Coast, Boulevard, Ninth Letter, and Sixth Finch. They have received a Fulbright Fellowship and a Katharine Bakeless Nason Scholarship for the Bread Loaf Environmental Writers' Conference, and they were a 2025 ASCA Grant recipient in poetry. They teach courses in creative writing, poetry, and editing at GVSU.
Kendra Allen
Tuesday, April 14, 2027
Craft talk: 11:30a - 12:45p, venue TBA
Reading and Q+A: 2:30p - 3:45p, venue TBA
Kendra Allen was born and raised in Dallas, Tx. She’s the author of the memoir Fruit Punch, the poetry collection The Collection Plate, and the essay collection When You Learn the Alphabet, which won the 2018 Iowa Prize for Literary Nonfiction. She received an M.F.A. from the University of Alabama, and among other things she loves driving, pauses, and hands. Repetition is her favorite literary device. Some of her other works can be found on, or in, The Paris Review, Oxford American, The Rumpus, High Times, and more. Good Morning Means I Love You is her first novel.
Be sure to check out past seasons of the Grand Valley Writers Series. Any questions about the series should be referred to Grand Valley Writers Series Coordinator, Professor Caitlin Horrocks ([email protected]).