We are proud to announce that Marie Myung-Ok Lee is the winner of the inaugural Conjunctions Residency, Writers Helping Writers.
Over the last two months, it has been heartening to see how many writers are out there devoting much of their precious time to supporting other writers in different and inventive ways. Their work is a gift to the literary community at large, and all of us at Conjunctions want to commend these creative and generous individuals. How we wish we could offer residencies to every one of them!
Thank you to our judge Rick Moody and our staff—Tayyba Kanwal, Lisa Wartenberg Vélez, and Eleanor Polak—who, in the same spirit as the residency itself, took time away from their own writing to read through so many worthy applications. Huge congratulations to our winner Marie Myung-Ok Lee and our six exceptional finalists!
2026 Winner
Photo by Jesse Ditmar
Marie Myung-Ok Lee is the author of the novel The Evening Hero. Her stories and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Nation, Slate, Guernica, The Paris Review, Prairie Schooner, Bomb, The Kenyon Review, The Guardian, and she was a New York Foundation for the Arts Fiction Fellow. She is a founder and former board president of the Asian American Writers’ Workshop and on the board of the National Book Critics Circle, where she is Vice President of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). She teaches fiction at Columbia and is working on a memoir.
2026 Finalists
Donna Hemans is the author of three novels, River Woman, Tea by the Sea, and The House of Plain Truth. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in numerous publications, including Electric Literature, Oprah Daily, Ms. Magazine, and Crab Orchard Review. She serves on the PEN/Faulkner Foundation board and is also the owner of DC Writers Room, a co-working studio for writers based in Washington, D.C. She teaches creative writing, most recently as a guest writer for Hood College’s low-residency MFA program.
Ruth Joffre is a Bolivian American writer, editor, and organizer. Author of the story collection Night Beast, she has published work in more than 100 magazines and been shortlisted for the Creative Capital Award. She co-organized the Fight for Our Lives performance series in Seattle and co-founded the Nightjar Arts Collective in Missouri, “a communal third place that supports and cultivates local artists, writers, and activists.” She is an Associate Editor for the Wigleaf Top 50 and an editor at Reckoning, where she is currently accepting submissions of novellas on the theme of environmental justice.
Andrew Altschul is the author of the novels The Gringa, Deus Ex Machina, and Lady Lazarus. His work has appeared in Esquire, McSweeney’s, Ploughshares, Fence, and anthologies including Best New American Voices, Best American Nonrequired Reading, and O. Henry Prize Stories. A former Wallace Stegner Fellow and Jones Lecturer at Stanford, he was the founding Books Editor of The Rumpus, and from 2009-2015 he directed the Center for Literary Arts in San José, CA. He is currently a contributing editor at ZYZZYVA, the Literature Advisor to the DAG Foundation, and Professor of English at Colorado State University.
Kyle Lucia Wu is the author of the novel Win Me Something, an NPR Best Book of the Year, and the co-author of the children’s book An Asian American A to Z: A Children’s Guide to Our History. Through Kyle’s work within the AAPI literary community, she has run feminist writing workshops, Wikipedia Edit-a-Thons, mentorship programs, and free panels on the publishing industry. She previously served as a prison writing mentor for PEN America and a mentor to formerly incarcerated interns at Asian Prisoner Support Committee. Her second novel Bottle Train is forthcoming in summer 2027.
Susan Wheeler is Professor Emerita at Princeton University. She is the author of one novel, Record Palace, and six collections of poetry, including Assorted Poems and Meme, which was shortlisted for the National Book Award. She has served as a judge for the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize; the James Laughlin Poetry Prize, Academy of American Poets; the Hopwood Prize for Poetry; the Cecil Hemley Memorial Award, Poetry Society of America; and is a contributing editor for the Sewanee Review, American Letters & Commentary, and elsewhere. Solid Objects Press will publish her Presidents later this year.
Kristina Ten is the author of Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine. Her stories appear in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction, The Best Weird Fiction of the Year, and elsewhere. She has won the McSweeney’s Stephen Dixon Award and been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson and Locus Awards. A graduate of the University of Colorado Boulder’s MFA fiction program, Ten hosts themed literary readings, serves as a Clarion West Writers Workshop mentor, and leads author talks and workshops on speculative, and experimental fiction.
About the Conjunctions Residency
The literary journal Conjunctions, now an independent publisher, has branched out to include a new and ambitious three-week writer’s residency under the auspices of the recently established Conjunctions Foundation. The mission of the Conjunctions Residency is to recognize and support writers of poetry, fiction, essays, hybrid and other literary works who have a publication history of accomplished, innovative work and have shown an ongoing personal commitment to helping other writers achieve their own creative goals.
The inaugural residency will take place in May 2026 in the vicinity of our upstate New York office in Livingston Manor at the foot of the Catskill Mountains. Residents will receive full room and board for the length of their stay at the beautiful Hemlock Neversink hotel. Surrounded by a 230-acre campus of hiking trails, woods, and wildflower meadows, writers will be provided a serene, private place in which to work without distraction. All meals will be provided by one of Foster Supply Hospitality’s award-winning chefs, and residents will have access to a spa facility, indoor swimming pool, and other amenities. An honorarium of $1000 to help facilitate travel will also be provided to accepted residents.
• writers who volunteer at an organization that supports the literary arts;
• writers helping to develop literary activity in underrepresented communities, rural or urban;
• writers who have launched and/or curate a reading series, youth writing workshop, literary advocacy or other literary outreach program;
• writers who work at a literary journal, indie publishing house, or publishing project.
Those whose work in the literary community differs from these several examples are also most welcome. We are selecting toward engagement outside formal academic settings but not excluding those who teach for a living. Our mission is straightforward: to support writers who have personally taken on the dual role of serving their muse while dedicating some of their time to help others who are devoted to the written word. The goal is to provide these generous individuals with unfettered time to focus on their own manuscripts in progress—whether in the first or final phase of composition—in a tranquil, supportive environment.
The successful applicant will be expected to lead a single-session workshop for local aspiring writers at the Livingston Manor–Roscoe Library midway through their residency and to give a public reading at Catskill Art Space in downtown Livingston Manor. Each resident will also have a selection of their writing published as a featured work in Conjunctions online at the end of their residency.
Applicants are required to have published at least one book. Each application must include a cover letter describing the applicant’s service to other writers or literary organizations, a current CV including works published, a writing sample of no more than 8-10 pages, and a proposal of no more than six hundred words about how the applicant envisions their residency time would be spent. Each applicant must be a citizen or legal resident of the United States. A non-refundable $35 fee must accompany each application.
The judge for our inaugural residency was award-winning novelist, memoirist, essayist, and poet Rick Moody. Future residents may apply in December on the Conjunctions website, in social media, and in the newsletter.
The Conjunctions Foundations Inc. is grateful for the support of our partners, Foster Supply Hospitality and Catskill Art Space.
FAQs
Q. Who is eligible to apply?
A. Applicants are required to have published at least one book and demonstrate substantial contributions in support of other writers.
Q. Is the residency set up as a community of multiple artists?
A. No. This is intended to be a private retreat for an individual writer during which they may focus on their work. There are arts organizations in the area that will be offering programs during the period of the residency and we will be glad to guide you to those programs.
Q. How long is the residency?
A. Three weeks in May, with the exact dates to be determined in consultation with the awardee.
Q. Will my travel expenses be covered?
A. The Conjunctions Foundation will provide a stipend of $1000 to use toward travel expenses.
Q. Can I bring partners, children, or friends to accompany me during part or all of my stay?
A. This award and residency is intended to provide focused time to facilitate the creative work of the awardee alone.
Q. Will Wi-Fi be available?
A. Yes. This will be available at no cost.
Q. Will meals be provided?
A. Yes. All meals will be provided.
Q. How far will I be from general amenities?
A. The hotel has facilities such as laundry, indoor pool, and gym. It is located in a vibrant community within walking distance to general amenities and nature walks. Transportation can be arranged for longer distance needs.
Q. Is this residency open to international applicants?
A. All applicants must be a US citizen or legal resident of the United States.
Q. Is there a fee for the application?
A. Yes. A non-refundable $35 fee must accompany each application.
Q. Must my writing sample be from recently written work?
A. Applications may choose from up to 10 pages of poetry or prose that they think best represents their work.
Q. I have more questions—who can I contact?
A. Please email managingeditor.conjunctions@gmail.com
