Works by Venita Blackburn have appeared or are forthcoming in the Virginia Quarterly Review, Paris Review, Los Angeles Review of Books Print Quarterly Journal, American Short Fiction, the Georgia Review, Pleiades, Madison Review, Bat City Review, Nashville Review, SmokeLong Quarterly, Café Irreal, Santa Monica Review, Faultline, Devil’s Lake Review, Nat.Brut., Bellevue Literary Review, audio download through Bound Off, and others. She was awarded a Bread Loaf Fellowship in 2014 and several Pushcart prize nominations. She received the Prairie Schooner book prize for fiction, which resulted in the publication of her collected stories, Black Jesus and Other Superheroes, in 2017. In 2018 she earned a place as a finalist for the PEN/Bingham award for debut fiction, finalist for the NYPL Young Lions award and recipient of the PEN America Los Angeles literary prize in fiction. Current projects include finishing a new novel, a collection of flash fiction and creative non-fiction. Her home town is Compton, California, and she is an Assistant Professor of creative writing at California State University, Fresno.
Stories in Smokelong Quarterly
Story:
Easter Egg Surprise
Interview: Smoke & Mirrors: An Interview with Venita Blackburn
Story:
Chew
Interview: Smoking With Venita Blackburn
In its third year, The March Micro Marathon will be, as usual, a prompt-a-day whirlwind for 24 days. You’ll exchange drafts of micro fiction, non-fiction, and prose poetry in small groups and gather for a series of online events (all recorded for participants unable to attend live). We’ll finish with 3 competitions, and participants who are not already in SmokeLong Fitness will be invited to workshop with SmokeLong Fitness until the end of April!