The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2013
Page 50
Anna Sanford is a senior at Piedmont High School in the Bay Area. She has spent much of her seventeen years in the company of books, many of whom she considers best friends. When not reading, Anna enjoys running, cooking, and spending time with friends. This is her first year of BANR, an experience that has not only taught her about the unusual longevity of a remote Greek island and the courage of a one-eyed matador, but changed her perspective on life itself.
Frances Saux is a senior at San Francisco’s Ruth Asawa School of the Arts, where she studies creative writing. She spends most of her free time reading books by David Foster Wallace. She hopes to someday publish her own stories and essays.
Abigail Schott-Rosenfield, seventeen, is a senior at the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts in San Francisco. At the moment she is enjoying Tell Me a Riddle by Tillie Olsen. She is also learning Arabic (Ahlan wasahlan. Ismi samir). She is pleased to have completed her second term on the BANR committee. Her muse is Hosanna Rubio.
Hannah Shevrin is a senior at Community High School in Ann Arbor. This is her third year on BANR, where she has spent her Tuesday evenings laughing with her fellow readers/editors about the oddities of life. She enjoys walking long distances on overcast days while listening to early 2000s R&B soul. One of the neatest moments of her life was when she was on a piece of land owned by a man whose last name was Land. She frequently receives compliments on her handwriting, and she is thinking of selling it. Watch out, Comic Sans!
Kate Shrayber is seventeen years old and a senior at Gateway High School in San Francisco. In her spare time she enjoys dirty chais and long walks on the beach. She’s currently completing a twelve step program with Bookaholics Anonymous due to her addiction to novels.
Sarah Starman is a senior at Pioneer High School in Ann Arbor. Summer is by far her favorite season, and her friends are tired of her saying that. She bakes cakes for people on their birthdays. She has an old-fashioned rotary telephone on her bed, and even when it rings at 2 a.m. she doesn’t disconnect it (mostly because she’s so tired she falls back asleep). She loves ’80s music, raspberries, and of course, BANR.
Miranda Wiebe is seventeen and a senior at Piedmont High School in the Bay Area. She enjoys running, gardening, ROFL-ing, and listening to Foxy Brown. Being on the BANR committee taught her many important life lessons, such as the theory of Schrodinger’s Cat and how to listen.
Emma Pearl Willmer-Shiles has too many names, is sixteen years old, and a senior at Sacred Heart High School in San Francisco. She enjoys reading science fiction in both English and Spanish, and has been obsessed with Greek mythology since her brother gave her The Golden Fleece in fifth grade. Drawing is one of her favorite activities and almost everything she owns has doodles on it.
Sabrina Yerena, fifteen years old, is a sophomore at Immaculate Conception Academy in San Francisco. At ICA, she is part of student council. After school, she can be found at 826 Valencia’s drop-in tutoring program, which she has attended for seven years now. In her free time she likes to play basketball and draw.
Oscar Zapata graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School in 2013 and has lived in San Francisco for the majority of his life. His hobbies include but are not limited to: taking apart his computer and putting it back together again, engaging strangers in friendly conversation, spending way too much money on his collection of hi-fi headphones, and wasting time on the internet.
Very special thanks to Scott Cohen, Nicole Angeloro, and Mark Robinson. Thanks also to 826 National, 826 Valencia, 826 Michigan, Laura Howard, Dan McKinley, Sunra Thompson, Brian McMullen, Alyson Sinclair, Isaac Fitzgerald, Jordan Bass, Sam Riley, Henry W. Leung, Jia Tolentino, Mimi Lok, Juliana Sloane, McKenna Stayner, Rachel Khong, Soraya Okuda, Jordan Karnes, Clara Sankey, Em-J Staples, Cliff Mayotte, Brian Christian, Chelsea Hogue, Gerald Richards, Ryan Lewis, Yalie Kamara, Raúl J. Alcantar, Emilie Coulson, Lauren Hall, María Inés Montes, Miranda Tsang, Gretchen Schrafft, Dana Riess, Naoki O’Bryan, Allie Washkin, Nolan Boomer, Erica Plumlee, Jessica McHugh, Paolo Yumol, Alex Ryan Bauer, and Nate Rogers.
Notable Nonrequired Reading of 2012
CHRIS ADRIAN
Grand Rounds, Granta
DANIEL ALARCON
The Provincials, Granta
KATYA APEKINA
Maureen and Marjorie, The Iowa Review
MATTHEW BAKER
A Cruel Gap-Toothed Boy, The Missouri Review
SHANE BAUER
Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America’s Prisons, Mother Jones
JOSH BEGLEY
A Gated Community, Tomorrow Magazine
BRIAN BOIES
A House Well Furnished, Zyzzyva
GINA LUJAN BOUBION
The American Dream is a Combination Lock, The Antioch Review
CHARLES BOWDEN
Return to the Arkansas Delta, National Geographic
JENNIFER CACICIO
The Jackson Six, Lemon
MELISSA CHADBURN
The Throwaways, The Rumpus
PAMELA COLLOFF
The Innocent Man, Texas Monthly
RICH COHEN
Pirate City, The Paris Review
GUY DELISLE
Jerusalem, Drawn and Quarterly
JAMES DEWILLE
Last Days on Rossmore, American Short Fiction
JUNOT DÍAZ
Miss Lora, The New Yorker
SUSAN DOMINUS
What Happened to the Girls in Le Roy, The New York Times Magazine
ROB EHLE
Chemistry, Zyzzyva
PATRICIA ENGEL
Aida, The Harvard Review
KIERA FELDMAN
Grace in Broken Arrow, This Land Press
AMITY GAIGE
The Soul Keeps the Body Up, One Story
J. MALCOLM GARCIA
City of the Dead, New Letters
VARUN GAURI
The Assistant Secretary, The Asian American Literary Review
JIM GAVIN
Bermuda, Zoetrope: All-Story
ROXANE GAY
We Are the Sacrifice of Darkness, American Short Fiction
DAVID GESSNER
Brant’s Requiem, Orion Magazine
ELIZABETH GILBERT
The Finest Wife, The Rumpus
JENNIFER GONNERMAN
The Man Who Charged Himself With Murder, New York Magazine
RIGOBERTO GONZÁLEZ
The Great Poetry Caper, The Poetry Foundation
AMELIA GRAY
These Are the Fables, Hobart
L.K. HANSON
Some Pages from the Story of My Hand, Ploughshares
JOSHUA HARMON
The Annotated Mix-Tape #8, Make Magazine
JOEANN HART
Piece of History, Fifth Wednesday Journal
JUSTIN HECKERT
The Hazards of Growing Up Painlessly, The New York Times Magazine
ALEKSANDAR HEMON
War Dogs, Granta
A.M. HOMES
Hello Everybody, Electric Literature
RENÉ HOUTRIDES
Griffonia, The Georgia Review
GEETHA IYER
The Glass World-Builder, Gulf Coast
TANIA JAMES
The Scriptological Review, A Public Space
LACY M. JOHNSON
The Addict, Creative Nonfiction
HEIDI JULAVITS
This Feels So Real, Harper’s
JESSICA FRANCIS KANE
American Lawn, A Public Space
JAY CASPIAN KANG
Question of Identity, Grantland
PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE
Cocaine Incorporated, The New York Times Magazine
VICTORIA KELLY
Finding the Good Light, The Carolina Quarterly
DAWNA KEMPER
Joshua Tree, Zyzzyva
PATRICIA GRACE KING
Rubia, The Florida Review Publications
PHIL KLAY
After Action Report, Tin House
NAIRA KUZMICH
The Fearcatcher of East Hollywood, Cutbank
CLARENCE LAI
Start Here, Hunger Mountain
Dan P. LEE
4:52 on Christmas Morning, New York Magazine
J. ROBERT LENNON
The Cottage on the Hill, Unstuck
BEN LERNER
Contest of Words, Harper’s
GIDEON LEWIS-KRAUS
Dance Dance Revolution, GQ
PHILLIP LOPATE
Why I Remain a Baseball Fan, Ploughshares
CHARLES C. MANN
State of the Species, Orion Magazine
ANDY MARTIN
Hair Piece: Derrida in the Wilderness, Raritan
ERIK MARTINY Sartorius, Fjords
KELLY MCEVERS
The Crackdown, The Washington Monthly
DAVID MCGLYNN
Leviathan, Creative Nonfiction
BRUCE MCKAY
The Wheel at the Cistern, Zyzzyva
KYLE MELLEN
Lighting in You a Tremendous Fire, The Mid-American Review
CHINA MIEVILLE
Oh, London, You Drama Queen, The New York Times Magazine
MARY MILLER
He Says I Am a Little Oven, The Mid-American Review
OTTESSA MOSHFEGH
Disgust, The Paris Review
LENORE MYKA
Wood Houses, West Branch
DINA NAYERI
Arya, The Alaska Quarterly Review
AMANDA PARRISH
Prime Time, N+1
KIRK PERRY
Heaven’s Chief Musician, The Alaskan Quarterly Review
RICHARD POWERS
Genie, Byliner
JOSEPHINE ROWE
The Vending Machine at the End of the World, The Iowa Review
SABRINA RUBIN ERDELY
The Gangster Princess of Beverly Hills, Rolling Stone
EMILY RUSKOVICH
An Impending Change of Heart, Zoetrope: All-Story
KAREN RUSSELL
Reeling for the Empire, Tin House
RUSS RYMER
Vanishing Voices, National Geographic
ELI SANDERS
The Shooter, River Teeth
ELI SASLOW
A Trip to the Threshing Floor, ESPN the Magazine
GEORGE SAUNDERS
The Semplica-Girl Diaries, The New Yorker
ELIZABETH SCHULTE Borders, Ninth Letter
MOLLY SENTELL HAILE
Wild Man Blues, Oxford American
MAGGIE SHIPSTEAD
The Great Central Pacific Guano Company, American Short Fiction
JOHANNA SKIBSRUD
The Electric Man, Ecotone
ANNA DELLA SUBIN
A Very Still Life, Bidoun
LAURA VAN DEN BERG
Lessons, American Short Fiction
MARK WARREN
Daddy: My Father’s Last Words, Esquire
DANIEL WESSLER RIORDAN
The Earth Will Swallow You, Indiana Review
TOM WILLIAMS
The Hotel Joseph Conrad, Jelly Bucket
JANE WONG
Unsent Correspondence, Memoir Journal
JENNY ZHANG
Outsider/Insider, Rookie
About 826 National
Proceeds from this book benefit youth literacy
A LARGE 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 6–18 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. We work with more than 6,000 volunteers and over 30,000 students nationally. We host hundreds of field trips and workshops, and we welcome over 200 students per day for after-school tutoring. 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.
826 NYC
826NYC’s writing center opened its doors in September 2004. Since then its programs have offered over one thousand students opportunities to improve 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.
826 LA
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.