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Kellogg Writers Series: Beth Nguyen (Memoir Reading)

in Kellogg Writers SeriesLP Approved Events

This event has ended

  • Date

    October 23, 2024

  • Time

    7:30 pm - 8:30 pm

  • UIndy Hall A

    Schwitzer Student Center, University of Indianapolis

Wednesday, October 23, 2024
7:30-8:30 p.m.
Schwitzer Student Center, UIndy Hall A
Memoir Reading
L/P Credit Available

Free and open to the public!

The Kellogg Writers Series brings writers of distinction to the University of Indianapolis campus for classroom discussions and free public readings.

Beth Nguyen is the author of four books, most recently the memoir Owner of a Lonely Heart, published by Scribner in 2023. Owner of a Lonely Heart was a New York Times Editors’ Choice pick and was named a best book of 2023 by NPR, Time, Oprah Daily, and BookPage. Nguyen’s three previous books, the memoir Stealing Buddha’s Dinner and the novels Short Girls and Pioneer Girl, were published by Viking Penguin. Her awards and honors include a Guggenheim Fellowship, an American Book Award, a PEN/Jerard Award from the PEN American Center, a Bread Loaf fellowship, and best book of the year honors from the Chicago Tribune and Library Journal. Her books have been included in community and university read programs around the country. Nguyen’s work has also appeared in numerous anthologies and publications including The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The New York Times, Literary Hub, Time Magazine, and The Best American Essays. 

Nguyen was born in Saigon. When she was a baby, she and her family came to the United States as refugees and were resettled in Michigan, where Nguyen grew up.

She received an MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan and is currently a professor in the creative writing program at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Praise:
“Beth Nguyen has created a new way to ache that is as comfortable exploring loss, loneliness and longing as it is exploring the contours of joy, survival and, really, the kind of fleshy isolation necessary to make lasting art. The premise here is so compelling, but the execution is otherworldly. Every page of Owner of a Lonely Heart will have you holding your chest with one hand to eagerly turning the page with the other. This book, and the making of lives it explores, is what memoir writing in the hands of a caring, curious wunderkind can be.”
— Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy