Lydia Cyrus
Please join me in congratulating Lydia Cyrus, second-year MFA student in the Department of English, for winning the 2019 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award in fiction.
Presented by Poets & Writers, the award helps winners make professional contacts in the publishing industry as they launch their careers. In October, representatives of Poets & Writers will accompany Lydia during her all-expenses-paid trip to New York City as she meets with agents, editors, authors, and others in the publishing business. Since the Writers Exchange began in 1984, 104 writers from 41 states have participated, with past winners publishing books, accepting fellowships, and securing teaching positions as a result of these meetings.
Fiction judge Bryn Chancellor selected Lydia’s manuscript In the Heartland as this year’s winning submission. In addition to the trip to New York City, Lydia will receive a $500 honorarium and will present a public reading in New York. She will also receive an invitation to participate in a one-month residency at the Jentel Artist Residency Program in Wyoming.
A native of Huntington, West Virginia, Lydia’s work has been featured in Thoreau’s Rooster, Adelaide Literary Magazine, the Albion Review, Catfish Creek, and Luna Luna Magazine.
Congratulations, Lydia!
David A. Reingold
Justin S. Morrill Dean
College of Liberal Arts