It was a surprise and honor to hear late last week that I would receive one of the Alabama State Council on the Arts’ Literary Arts Fellowships! The announcement was made on June 5 about the arts and literature fellowships for the council’s upcoming 2021 year. I’m also pleased and humbled to be in such good company, with Glenny Brock from Birmingham, Nabila Lovelace from Tuscaloosa, and Charlotte Pence from Mobile receiving the other three fellowships for writers. 

For my fellowship, I proposed – and now will be working on – a project called Nobody’s Home: Modern Southern Folklore, which will collect works of creative nonfiction about the prevailing ideas and beliefs that have shaped the modern South. The fellowship won’t begin until October, so there’s work to be done between now and then. The project’s website will soon be ready to launch, and submission guidelines will be available there.