You Rang?, Harper’s
LYDIA DAVIS
The Gold Digger of Goldfields, Fence
JOSHUA DAVIS
Dangerous, Wired
MICHAEL DEAGLER
Etymology, Glimmer Train
ALEXA DERMAN
Variations on Ophelia, Word Riot
JAQUIRA DÍAZ
Ghosts, Kenyon Review
TOM DRURY
Multistrada, A Public Space
CHARLES EAST
Virgo, Sewanee Review
BRIAN EVENSON
The Dust, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern
JOSHUA FERRIS
The Breeze, The New Yorker
AJA GABEL
In the Time of Adonis, Glimmer Train
J. MALCOLM GARCIA
Revolution Download, Guernica
BULL GARLINGTON
Reliquary, Slab
ISABEL GREENBERG
The Bible of Birdman, The Encyclopedia of Early Earth
SAM GRIEVE
Curious Things That Happened to Her in Paris, PANK
JULIE HECHT
May I Touch Your Hair, Harper’s
CAROL K. HOWELL
Bricks, Alaska Quarterly Review
ALAYA DAWN JOHNSON
They Shall Salt the Earth with Seeds of Glass, Asimov’s
ANOTHAI KAEWKAEN
Fed with Desire: The Food Poems of King Rama II, Jelly Bucket
JAY CASPIAN KANG
The End and Don King, Grantland
JENNY KUTNER
The Other Side of the Story, Texas Monthly
KIMBERLY LAMBRIGHT
I Want to Continue, ZYZZYVA
ALEXANDER MAKSIK
Trim Palace, Tin House
LIZZIE MARTIN
Too Small Yet, Adroit Journal
THOMAS MCGUANE
Crow Fair, Granta
HAMILTON MORRIS
Blood Spore, Harper’s
OTTESSA MOSHFEGH
Bettering Myself, Paris Review
HARUKI MURAKAMI
Samsa in Love, The New Yorker
MICHAEL PATERNITI
An American Man’s Quest to Become an Old Castilian, New York Times Magazine
ROLF POTTS
The Misadventures of Wenamun, The Common
KENT RUSSELL
Mithradates of Fon du Lac, The Believer
MARJORIE SANDOR
DarkFruit.com, Harvard Review
DAVID SEDARIS
Now We Are Five, The New Yorker
MIKA SEIFERT
The Intervention, Southern Review
DANIEL SOMERS
Phoenix, 2013, Lapham’s Quarterly
MAYA SONENBERG
Four Phoebes, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet
ALICE STERN
The Princess of All Princesses, Santa Monica Review
BARRETT SWANSON
Annie Radcliffe, You Are Loved, American Short Fiction
TERRY ANN THAXTON
Delusions of Grandeur, Missouri Review
AHMIR QUESTLOVE THOMPSON
Trayvon Martin and I Ain’t Shit, New York
WELLS TOWER
The Dance Contest, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern
INARA VERZEMNIEKS
The Last Days of Baldock, Tin House
JUAN PABLO VILLALOBOS
Photisms, ZYZZYVA
DOUGLAS WATSON
The Messenger Who Did Not Become a Hero, One Story
NANCY WELCH
Pretty, Ploughshares
JESSICA WILBANKS
On the Far Side of the Fire, Ninth Letter
KEVIN WILSON
The Horror We Made, American Short Fiction
JEFF WINKLER
Getaway Blues, Oxford American
ELLIOTT D. WOODS
The Kunar Nine, Prairie Schooner
ABOUT 826 NATIONAL
Proceeds from this book benefit youth literacy.
A PERCENTAGE OF the cover price of this book goes to 826 National, a network of eight youth-tutoring, writing, and publishing centers in eight cities around the country.
Since the birth of 826 National in 2002, our goal has been to assist students ages six to eighteen with their writing skills while helping teachers get their classes passionate about writing. We do this with a vast army of volunteers who donate their time so we can give as much one-on-one attention as possible to the students whose writing needs it. Our mission is based on the understanding that great leaps in learning can happen with one-on-one attention, and that strong writing skills are fundamental to future success.
Through volunteer support, each of the eight 826 chapters—in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Ann Arbor, Chicago, Seattle, Boston, and Washington, DC—provides drop-in tutoring, class field trips, writing workshops, and in-schools programs, all free of charge, for students, classes, and schools. 826 centers are especially committed to supporting teachers, offering services and resources for English language learners, and publishing student work. Each of the 826 chapters works to produce professional-quality publications written entirely by young people, to forge relationships with teachers in order to create innovative workshops and lesson plans, to inspire students to write and appreciate the written word, and to rally thousands of enthusiastic volunteers to make it all happen. By offering all of our programming for free, we aim to serve families who cannot afford to pay for the level of personalized instruction their children receive through 826 chapters.
The demand for 826 National’s services is tremendous. Last year we worked with more than 6,000 volunteers and over 29,000 students nationally, hosted 646 field trips, completed 220 major inschool projects, offered 387 evening and weekend workshops, welcomed over 200 students per day for after-school tutoring, and produced over 900 student publications. At many of our centers, our field trips are fully booked almost a year in advance, teacher requests for in-school tutor support continue to rise, and the majority of our evening and weekend workshops have waitlists.
826 National volunteers are local community residents, professional writers, teachers, artists, college students, parents, bankers, lawyers, and retirees from a wide range of professions. These passionate individuals can be found at all of our centers after school, sitting side by side with our students, providing one-on-one attention. They can be found running our field trips, or helping an entire classroom of local students learn how to write a story, or assisting student writers during one of our Young Authors’ Book programs.
All day and in a variety of ways, our volunteers are actively connecting with youth from the communities we serve.
To learn more or get involved, please visit:
826 National: www.826national.org
826 San Francisco: www.826valencia.org
826 New York: www.826nyc.org
826 Los Angeles: www.826la.org
826 Chicago: www.826chi.org
826 Ann Arbor: www.826mi.org
826 Seattle: www.826seattle.org
826 Boston: www.826boston.org
826 Washington, DC: www.826dc.org
826 VALENCIA
Named for the street address of the building it occupies in the heart of San Francisco’s Mission District, 826 Valencia opened on April 8, 2002, and consists of a writing lab, a street-front, student-friendly retail pirate store that partially funds its programs, and satellite classrooms in two local middle schools. 826 Valencia has developed programs that reach students at every possible opportunity—in school, after school, in the evenings, or on the weekends. Since its doors opened, over fifteen hundred volunteers—including published authors, magazine founders, SAT course instructors, documentary filmmakers, and other professionals—have donated their time to work with thousands of students. These volunteers allow the center to offer all of its services for free.
826NYC
826NYC’s writing center opened its doors in September 2004. Since then its programs have offered over one thousand students opportunities to impr
ove their writing and to work side by side with hundreds of community volunteers. 826NYC has also built a satellite tutoring center, created in partnership with the Brooklyn Public Library, which has introduced library programs to an entirely new community of students. The center publishes a handful of books of student writing each year.
826LA
826LA benefits greatly from the wealth of cultural and artistic resources in the Los Angeles area. The center regularly presents a free workshop at the Armand Hammer Museum, in which esteemed artists, writers, and performers teach their craft. 826LA has collaborated with the J. Paul Getty Museum to create Community Photoworks, a months-long program that taught seventh-graders the basics of photographic composition and analysis, sent them into Los Angeles with cameras, and then helped them polish artist statements. Since opening in March 2005, 826LA has provided thousands of hours of free one-on-one writing instruction, held summer camps for English language learners, given students sportswriting training in the Lakers’ press room, and published love poems written from the perspectives of leopards.
826 CHICAGO
826 Chicago opened its writing lab and after-school tutoring center in the West Town community of Chicago, in the Wicker Park neighborhood. The setting is both culturally lively and teeming with schools: within one mile, there are fifteen public schools serving more than sixteen thousand students. The center opened in October 2005 and now has over five hundred volunteers. Its programs, like at all the 826 chapters, are designed to be both challenging and enjoyable. Ultimately, the goal is to strengthen each student’s power to express ideas effectively, creatively, confidently, and in his or her individual voice.
826MICHIGAN
826Michigan opened its doors on June 1, 2005, on South State Street in Ann Arbor. In October 2007 the operation moved downtown, to a new and improved location on Liberty Street. This move enabled the opening of Liberty Street Robot Supply & Repair in May 2008. The shop carries everything the robot owner might need, from positronic brains to grasping appendages to solar cells. 826Michigan is the only 826 not named after a city because it serves students all over southeastern Michigan, hosting in-school residencies in Ypsilanti schools, and providing workshops for students in the Detroit, Lincoln, and Willow Run school districts. The center also has a packed workshop schedule on site every semester, with offerings on making pop-up books, writing sonnets, creating screenplays, producing infomercials, and more.
826 SEATTLE
826 Seattle began offering afterschool tutoring in October 2005, followed shortly by evening and weekend writing workshops and, in December 2005, the first field trip to 826 Seattle by a public school class (Ms. Dunker’s fifth graders from Greenwood Elementary). The center is in Greenwood, one of the most diverse neighborhoods in the city. And, thankfully, enough space travelers stop by the Greenwood Space Travel Supply Company at 826 Seattle on their way back from the Space Needle. Revenue from the store, like from all 826 storefronts, helps to support the writing programs, along with the generous outpouring from community members.
826 BOSTON
826 Boston kicked off its programming in the spring of 2007 by inviting authors Junot Diaz, Steve Almond, Holly Black, and Kelly Link to lead writing workshops at the English High School. The visiting writers challenged students to modernize fairy tales, invent their ideal school, and tell their own stories. Afterward, a handful of dedicated volunteers followed up with weekly visits to help students develop their writing craft. These days, the center has thrown open its doors in Roxbury’s Egleston Square—a culturally diverse community south of downtown that stretches into Jamaica Plain, Roxbury, and Dorchester. 826 Boston neighbors more than twenty Boston schools, a dance studio, and the Boston Neighborhood Network (a public-access television station).
826DC
826 National’s newest chapter, 826DC, opened its doors to the city’s Columbia Heights neighborhood in September 2010. Like all the 826s, 826DC provides after-school tutoring, field trips, after-school workshops, in-school tutoring, help for English language learners, and assistance with the publication of student work. It also offers free admission to the Museum of Unnatural History, the center’s unique storefront. 826DC volunteers recently helped publish a student-authored poetry book project called Dear Brain. 826DC’s students have also already read poetry for the President and First Lady Obama, participating in the 2011 White House Poetry Student Workshop.
SCHOLARMATCH
ScholarMatch is a nonprofit organization that aims to make college possible by connecting under-resourced students with donors. Launched in 2010 as a project of 826 National, ScholarMatch uses crowd funding to help high-achieving, San Francisco Bay Area students who have significant financial need. But it takes more than money to ensure that students successfully complete college. That’s why ScholarMatch also offers student support services and partners with college access organizations, nonprofits, and high schools to ensure that students have the network and resources they need to succeed.
More than 80 percent of ScholarMatch students are the first in their families to go to college, and over 50 percent of them have annual family incomes of less than $25,000. ScholarMatch students are resilient young people who have overcome harrowing challenges, and maintain their determination to seek a better future through college.
With commitments from donors, we ensure that young people in our community receive the education they need to succeed in a challenging economic landscape. To support our students’ college journey or to learn more about our organization, visit scholarmatch.org.
Visit www.hmhco.com to find all of the books in The Best American Series®.
About the Editors
DANIEL HANDLER, editor, is the author of the novels Why We Broke Up, Adverbs, The Basic Eight, and Watch Your Mouth, and under the pen name Lemony Snicket, best-selling children’s and young adult novels. He lives in San Francisco.
LEMONY SNICKET, guest introducer, is the author of the thirteen-book sequence A Series of Unfortunate Events and the four-book series All the Wrong Questions, among (too) many others.
The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2014 Page 41
