Zone 3 Visiting Writers Series: Destiny Birdsong
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Destiny Birdsong, a renowned novelist, poet, and essayist, at 7
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Destiny Birdsong, a renowned novelist, poet, and essayist, at 7
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Toni Jensen, a renowned prose author and professor, on Thursday, February 19, 2026 in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Jensen’s work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Jenny Molberg, an award-winning poet whose work has appeared in publications across the country, on Thursday, Nov. 13, in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Molberg’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Pulitzer Prize finalist Rebecca Makkai at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 18, in the Mabry Concert Hall at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Makkai’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Rebecca Makkai is a Chicago-based author holding the 2025-26 Acuff Chair of Excellence and will also read at this spring’s Zone 3 Writers’ Festival (April 16-18, 2026). Makkai honors country music legend Roy Acuff as a distinguished author of the New York Times bestselling I Have Some Questions For You, as well as four other works of fiction. Makkai was a finalist for both the 2019 Pulitzer Prize and the 2018 National Book Award and she is the winner of the ALA Carnegie Medal and the LA Times Book Prize. Her short stories have been anthologized in The Pushcart Prize XLI in 2017 among many others. Makkai continues her work as a graduate fiction teacher at Middlebury College, Northwestern University, and the Bennington Writing Seminars.
The Zone 3 Visiting Writers Series, the Betty Joe Wallace Memorial Lecture, and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA, or “seek-ah”) will host a free public event with McArthur Genius Fellow Kiese Laymon at 7 p.m. on Thursday, March 20, in Mabry Concert Hall. The nationally acclaimed author will read from and discuss his life and work, followed by a Q&A session and book signing. Read more here.
Kiese Laymon is a Black southern writer from Jackson, Mississippi. Laymon is the Libbie Shearn Moody Professor of English and Creative Writing at Rice University. Laymon is the author of Long Division, which won the 2022 NAACP Image Award for fiction, and the essay collection, How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America, named a notable book of 2021 by the New York Times critics. Laymon’s bestselling memoir, Heavy: An American Memoir, won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, the Christopher Isherwood Prize for Autobiographical Prose, the Barnes and Noble Discovery Award, the Austen Riggs Erikson Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media, and was named one of the 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years by The New York Times. The audiobook, read by the author, was named the Audible 2018 Audiobook of the Year. Laymon is the recipient of 2020-2021 Radcliffe Fellowship at Harvard. Laymon is at work on the books, Good God, and City Summer, Country Summer, and a number of other film and television projects. He is the founder of The Catherine Coleman Literary Arts and Justice Initiative, a program based out of the Margaret Walker Center at Jackson State University, aimed at aiding young people in Jackson get more comfortable reading, writing, revising and sharing on their on their own terms, in their own communities. He is the co-host of Reckon True Stories with Deesha Philyaw. Kiese Laymon was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2022.
This casual event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Andrea Spofford at spofforda@apsu.edu. For questions about Zone 3 and its events, you can email zone3@apsu.edu.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Rigoberto González reads from his memoir, Abuela in Shadow, Abuela in Light, Thursday, April 4 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building, room 120, at Austin Peay State University.
Standing over two graves, Rigoberto González studies the names “Ramon” and “María” under the family name “González.” “She was María Carrillo, not María González,” he thinks. His grandmother is missing. So begins González’s memoir, a journey to recover a more complete picture of his grandmother, who raised him following his mother’s death. This memoir unveils the hidden lives that even those we love best can hide from us.
Rigoberto González is a distinguished professor of English and director of the MFA program in creative writing at Rutgers University-Newark, and is the author of eighteen books of poetry and prose. Recipient of the PEN/Voelcker Award, the Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award, and Lannan, Guggenheim, USA Rolón, and NEA fellowships, he was the finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for a previous memoir, What Drowns the Flowers in Your Mouth.
Join us as Austin Peay alumni, Joanna Grisham and Sugar Le Fae, read from their most recently published work on Thursday, February 22, 2024 at 7:00 PM in room 120 of the Art + Design building!
There will be a Q&A session, a book signing, and a giveaway after the reading. This event is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be served.
This event is sponsored by the Center for Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) and the APSU Languages and Literature Department.
Our 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, is now available for order!
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts are very excited to host a reading with L. S. McKee and Tiana Clark. This reading celebrates the launch of McKee’s debut poetry collection, Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry judged by author Tiana Clark.
Join us for some poetry and light refreshments on Thursday, October 12 at 7:00 PM. This event is free and open to the public, and it will be hosted in the Art + Design building on Austin Peay’s campus.
In Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, through a series of narrative and lyric poems, we follow the central protagonist, Alva, as she grapples with heartbreak, desire, mortality and her search for love in a world where both Nature and relationships are increasingly shaped by technology. From the desert to MRI machines to online dating to the Large Hadron Collider to the flora and fauna of natural and imagined worlds, Alva seeks meaning and the keys to human connection.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Joe Milan reads from his debut novel, The All-American, this Thursday, September 14 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building at Austin Peay State University.
In a reverse of the American immigrant novel, The All-American follows Bucky, a Korean American high school senior whose real name no one can pronounce. Never knowing his mother and abandoned by his father, Bucky grows up in a rural Washington trailer park dreaming of playing college football. However, his football dreams are snuffed out as the U.S. government deports him and the South Korean government conscripts him. With this, Bucky confronts the fact that how he sees himself is not how others see him.
Joe Milan Jr. is a second-generation Korean American and taught in South Korea for nine years. An assistant professor of creative writing at Waldorf University, he lives in Forest City, Iowa.
The Zone 3 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, will launch October 1, 2023, but you can pre-order your copy now here. Orders will ship in early October.
We are excited to announce that judge Tiana Clark has selected L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine as the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry. McKee will receive $1,000 and her book will be published in fall 2023.
L.S. McKee’s writing has appeared in Narrative, The Massachusetts Review, Best New Poets, Cincinnati Review, The Georgia Review, Copper Nickel, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Maryland and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in poetry at Stanford University. Originally from East Tennessee, she is a lecturer at MIT and lives in the Boston area.
You can find more information about L.S. McKee at www.lsmckee.com
Sincerest thanks to our readers, to final judge Tiana Clark, and to all who submitted to this year’s contest.
Photo credit: Stephanie Alvarez Ewens
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Aram Goudsouzian from 7-9 p.m. April 5 in Heydel Hall, located inside Austin Peay’s Art + Design Building.
The evening is funded by the Roy Acuff Chair of Excellence and will feature Goudsouzian in a live reading, followed by a public Q&A session and a book signing. This event is free and open to the public, with light refreshments served. Copies of Goudsouzian’s books will be available for purchase.
Goudsouzian is the Bizot Family Professor of History at the University of Memphis. His research includes 20th century American history, with a particular focus on race, politics and culture. Most of his books and articles have examined the era of the civil rights movement from a variety of angles, though his most recent book is on the presidential election of 1968, and he is pursuing some projects in U.S. sports history.
During this reading and Q&A, Goudsouzian will discuss his collaboration with illustrator Bill Murray to create “Man on a Mission,” an illustrated graphic history of James Meredith, the first Black American to attend The University of Mississippi in the early 1960s during the Jim Crow era.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Amy Wright at wrighta@apsu.edu.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Victoria Chang on March 22, from 7-9 p.m. in Heydel Hall, located inside the APSU Art + Design building.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) at Austin Peay State University will host bestselling author Bonnie Jo Campbell on February 15 from 7:00pm – 9:00pm in Art & Design room 120.
Join us for a poetry reading by APSU alums Alexa Doran, Chris Hayes, and Victoria Moore! These talented writers will also join our workshop on September 15th.
Zone 3’s Annual Broadside Competition is on a brief hiatus, but it will return soon!
We are excited to announce that judge Wendy S. Walters has selected Erin Langner’s Souvenirs from Paradise as the winner of our 2021 Creative Nonfiction Book Award!
Zone 3 is excited to announce the winners of its annual literary awards in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction: Gemini Wahhaj, Juleen Eun Sun Johnson, and Gwendolyn Paradice.
Writer, educator and spoken word poet Sarah Kay will bring her engaging performance style to Austin Peay State University through a live virtual appearance at 8 p.m. CST on Thursday, Oct. 7.
Poets Paige Lewis, Komal Mathew, and Emily Spencer will present a virtual reading of their poetry on Sept. 16 for Zone 3 Press’s First Book Award Poetry Reading.
On a May afternoon in 2013, Barry Kitterman stood inside the Mable Larson Gallery of the Harned Building, celebrating the end of the semester with colleagues and students.
Nova Cypress Black Wins the 2020 Broadside Competition
Join us for a reading with Diana Khoi Nguyen on February 4, 2021 at 7:30 CST via Zoom Webinar. Click this link to register. This event is hosted by Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at Austin Peay State University.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Darius Atefat-Peckham, Kathryn Nuernberger, and Heather Turbeville.
We are beyond excited to announce the co-winners of our 2020 Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Judge Paige Lewis selected East Walnut Hills: A Gothic Epic by Emily Spencer and For Daughters Who Walk Out Like Sons by Komal Mathew! These books will be published in fall 2021.
Zone 3 is happy to host another reading, featuring Bill Konigsberg, on October 14 at 7 PM CDT!
We are pleased to announce the second annual Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and The Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man is available now! Read an excerpt HERE. Purchase it HERE. What others are saying:
“Psalm 8” by Julie Swarstad Johnson was the winner of our 2019 Broadside Competition, and the broadside edition is now available for purchase.
Upcoming Reading Alert! Zone 3 Press is happy to be hosting its first reading of the semester on September 10 at 7 PM, welcoming Sarah Kasbeer and Alice Bolin as the featured panelists.
At Zone 3 Press and Zone 3 journal we stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.
Cathryn Hankla will present her work Thursday, Feb. 6th, at 8 PM in the Art & Design Building, Heydel Hall (Room 120) as part of the Zone 3 Reading Series. A reception and book signing will follow. This event is free and open to the public.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests.
Join us for a reading with Patty Crane and Jenn Givhan in celebration of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Crane’s manuscript, Bell I Wake To, was selected by judge Jenn Givhan as winner of this contest. A book signing and reception will follow the reading. All Zone 3 Reading Series events are free and open to the public.
We are pleased to announce the first ever Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and the Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
As part of the Zone 3 Reading series, Margaret Renkl will visit APSU to read from her new book, Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss, on Wednesday, September 11. The reading will take place in room 120 of the Art & Design building and will begin at 8 p.m. A reception and book signing will follow the event.
We are happy to announce that judge Alice Bolin has selected Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man as winner of the 2019 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Sarah will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2020.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Randal O’Wain for his story “Hallelujah Station” (Fall 2018); Ethan Chua for his poem “Immigrant Prayer” (Spring 2018); and Carrie Shipers for her essay “Mea Culpa, My Monster” (Fall 2018).
We are happy to announce that judge Jenn Givhan has selected Patty Crane’s BELL I WAKE TO as the 2018 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award for Poetry! Patty will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2019.
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at APSU will be hosting a reading by Steve Yarbrough in the Margaret Fort Trahern Laboratory Theater.
Former Zone 3 editor Blas Falconer is the author of multiple books, including Forgive the Body This Failure, The Foundling Wheel, A Questions of Gravity and Light, and The Perfect Hour. Falconer teaches in the MFA program at San Diego State University. To learn more, visit blasfalconer.com.
As we close out the year and our reading period, Zone 3 editors reminisce on the past year.
Zone 3 Press and the APSU Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host a reading by writer Eric LeMay on March 1 @ 4:00 pm in the Art & Design Building, room 120. A reception and book signing will follow the reading.
Carrie Meadows is author of Speak, My Tongue (Calypso Editions, 2017), a poetry collection celebrating self-taught artists of the American South.
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00. This year’s readers are Hannah Boyd, Tim Donahoo, Caleb Ervin, Arizona Hurn, Barry Kitterman & Allison Parker. Music by Chuck Emery. A $5 donation for the APSU Food Pantry is requested at the door.
We are happy to announce that judge Janisse Ray has selected Kelly Beard’s memoir, AN IMPERFECT RAPTURE, as the 2017 winner of the Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Kelly will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2018.
On October 26, 2017 at 4 pm in the APSU Art & Design Building, Room 120, Stephanie Dugger, an alumna of Austin Peay, will read from her new book, Either Way, You’re Done (Sundress Publications, 2017). Her chapbook, Sterling (Paper Nautilus, 2015), won the Vella Chapbook contest. She teaches at Austin Peay State University and is Assistant Poetry Editor for Zone 3 literary journal.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: Dan Beachy-Quick, for his essay “, Even” (Spring 2017); A.D. Lauren, for her poem “Hermeneutics of a 21-year-old’s Death” (Fall 2017); and Yuly Restrepo, for her story “Morocho” (Spring 2017).
Cait Weiss Orcutt and Douglas Kearney will give a reading from their work on October 5, 2017 at 8pm.
STEVEN SHERRILL has been making trouble with words since 8th grade, when he was suspended from school for two weeks for a story he wrote.
DOROTHY ALLISON, recipient of the 2016-17 Acuff Chair of Excellence, will give a reading from her work on April 7, 2017 at 8 pm in the APSU Mabry Concert Hall.
ERIK ANDERSON won the 2015 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award for his collection of essays, FLUTTER POINT (Zone 3 Press, March 15, 2017). AMY FUSSELMAN is a writer, editor, and publisher based in New York City.
We are happy to announce that judge Douglas Kearney has selected Cait Weiss Orcutt’s collection VALLEYSPEAK as the 2016 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award. Cait will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2017. Congratulations, Cait!
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00.
Zone 3 Press is pleased to announce that Erik Anderson’s forthcoming collection of essays, Flutter Point, is now available for preorder. Erik’s manuscript was selected by Amy Fusselman
ZONE 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: David Huddle, for his essay “Verbal Binary Presence in Early Childhood Development, that Infamously Difficult Poetic Form the Villanelle, and the Spiritual Quotidian” (Fall 2016); James Braziel, for his story “Shiner” (Spring 2016); and Erinn Batykefer, for her poem “Two Bees” (Spring 2016).
A reading to celebrate Zone 3’s 30th anniversary featuring Dustin Parsons, Gary McDowell & Caitlin McGuire
Allison is the author of the poetry collection The Women Who Hate Me: Poems 1980–1990
Reading Features Andrea Spofford, Amy Wright, and Barry Kitterman
Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of three poetry collections: Lucky Fish (2011), winner of the gold medal in poetry from the Independent Publisher Book Awards and the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize for Independent Books; At the Drive-in Volcano (2007), winner of the Balcones Prize; and Miracle Fruit (2003), winner of Tupelo Press Prize, ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year Award, the Global Filipino Award and finalist for the Glasgow Prize and the Asian American Literary Award.
Iconoclast reviews Z3’s Fall 2015 issue, calling it “the right mix of the literary and the accessible, the intimate and the grand.”
Zone 3 Press is proud to announce Museum of Distance, the first collection of works from poet Ashley Seitz Kramer.
The Spring 2016 issue of Zone 3 opens without preface or fanfare, allowing the writing to speak for itself.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn.– Austin Peay State University Associate Professor of Creative Writing Dr. Amy Wright is preparing for a busy 2016, as the poet, author and teacher will publish four collections of her writing, including her fifth chapbook, “Wherever The Land Is.”
We are excited to welcome our esteemed alumni back to Austin Peay for a reading at The Trahern Gallery. Join us at 4:00pm to hear Raven
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Destiny Birdsong, a renowned novelist, poet, and essayist, at 7
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Toni Jensen, a renowned prose author and professor, on Thursday, February 19, 2026 in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Jensen’s work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Jenny Molberg, an award-winning poet whose work has appeared in publications across the country, on Thursday, Nov. 13, in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Molberg’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Pulitzer Prize finalist Rebecca Makkai at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 18, in the Mabry Concert Hall at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Makkai’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Rebecca Makkai is a Chicago-based author holding the 2025-26 Acuff Chair of Excellence and will also read at this spring’s Zone 3 Writers’ Festival (April 16-18, 2026). Makkai honors country music legend Roy Acuff as a distinguished author of the New York Times bestselling I Have Some Questions For You, as well as four other works of fiction. Makkai was a finalist for both the 2019 Pulitzer Prize and the 2018 National Book Award and she is the winner of the ALA Carnegie Medal and the LA Times Book Prize. Her short stories have been anthologized in The Pushcart Prize XLI in 2017 among many others. Makkai continues her work as a graduate fiction teacher at Middlebury College, Northwestern University, and the Bennington Writing Seminars.
The Zone 3 Visiting Writers Series, the Betty Joe Wallace Memorial Lecture, and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA, or “seek-ah”) will host a free public event with McArthur Genius Fellow Kiese Laymon at 7 p.m. on Thursday, March 20, in Mabry Concert Hall. The nationally acclaimed author will read from and discuss his life and work, followed by a Q&A session and book signing. Read more here.
Kiese Laymon is a Black southern writer from Jackson, Mississippi. Laymon is the Libbie Shearn Moody Professor of English and Creative Writing at Rice University. Laymon is the author of Long Division, which won the 2022 NAACP Image Award for fiction, and the essay collection, How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America, named a notable book of 2021 by the New York Times critics. Laymon’s bestselling memoir, Heavy: An American Memoir, won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, the Christopher Isherwood Prize for Autobiographical Prose, the Barnes and Noble Discovery Award, the Austen Riggs Erikson Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media, and was named one of the 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years by The New York Times. The audiobook, read by the author, was named the Audible 2018 Audiobook of the Year. Laymon is the recipient of 2020-2021 Radcliffe Fellowship at Harvard. Laymon is at work on the books, Good God, and City Summer, Country Summer, and a number of other film and television projects. He is the founder of The Catherine Coleman Literary Arts and Justice Initiative, a program based out of the Margaret Walker Center at Jackson State University, aimed at aiding young people in Jackson get more comfortable reading, writing, revising and sharing on their on their own terms, in their own communities. He is the co-host of Reckon True Stories with Deesha Philyaw. Kiese Laymon was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2022.
This casual event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Andrea Spofford at spofforda@apsu.edu. For questions about Zone 3 and its events, you can email zone3@apsu.edu.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Rigoberto González reads from his memoir, Abuela in Shadow, Abuela in Light, Thursday, April 4 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building, room 120, at Austin Peay State University.
Standing over two graves, Rigoberto González studies the names “Ramon” and “María” under the family name “González.” “She was María Carrillo, not María González,” he thinks. His grandmother is missing. So begins González’s memoir, a journey to recover a more complete picture of his grandmother, who raised him following his mother’s death. This memoir unveils the hidden lives that even those we love best can hide from us.
Rigoberto González is a distinguished professor of English and director of the MFA program in creative writing at Rutgers University-Newark, and is the author of eighteen books of poetry and prose. Recipient of the PEN/Voelcker Award, the Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award, and Lannan, Guggenheim, USA Rolón, and NEA fellowships, he was the finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for a previous memoir, What Drowns the Flowers in Your Mouth.
Join us as Austin Peay alumni, Joanna Grisham and Sugar Le Fae, read from their most recently published work on Thursday, February 22, 2024 at 7:00 PM in room 120 of the Art + Design building!
There will be a Q&A session, a book signing, and a giveaway after the reading. This event is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be served.
This event is sponsored by the Center for Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) and the APSU Languages and Literature Department.
Our 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, is now available for order!
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts are very excited to host a reading with L. S. McKee and Tiana Clark. This reading celebrates the launch of McKee’s debut poetry collection, Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry judged by author Tiana Clark.
Join us for some poetry and light refreshments on Thursday, October 12 at 7:00 PM. This event is free and open to the public, and it will be hosted in the Art + Design building on Austin Peay’s campus.
In Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, through a series of narrative and lyric poems, we follow the central protagonist, Alva, as she grapples with heartbreak, desire, mortality and her search for love in a world where both Nature and relationships are increasingly shaped by technology. From the desert to MRI machines to online dating to the Large Hadron Collider to the flora and fauna of natural and imagined worlds, Alva seeks meaning and the keys to human connection.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Joe Milan reads from his debut novel, The All-American, this Thursday, September 14 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building at Austin Peay State University.
In a reverse of the American immigrant novel, The All-American follows Bucky, a Korean American high school senior whose real name no one can pronounce. Never knowing his mother and abandoned by his father, Bucky grows up in a rural Washington trailer park dreaming of playing college football. However, his football dreams are snuffed out as the U.S. government deports him and the South Korean government conscripts him. With this, Bucky confronts the fact that how he sees himself is not how others see him.
Joe Milan Jr. is a second-generation Korean American and taught in South Korea for nine years. An assistant professor of creative writing at Waldorf University, he lives in Forest City, Iowa.
The Zone 3 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, will launch October 1, 2023, but you can pre-order your copy now here. Orders will ship in early October.
We are excited to announce that judge Tiana Clark has selected L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine as the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry. McKee will receive $1,000 and her book will be published in fall 2023.
L.S. McKee’s writing has appeared in Narrative, The Massachusetts Review, Best New Poets, Cincinnati Review, The Georgia Review, Copper Nickel, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Maryland and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in poetry at Stanford University. Originally from East Tennessee, she is a lecturer at MIT and lives in the Boston area.
You can find more information about L.S. McKee at www.lsmckee.com
Sincerest thanks to our readers, to final judge Tiana Clark, and to all who submitted to this year’s contest.
Photo credit: Stephanie Alvarez Ewens
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Aram Goudsouzian from 7-9 p.m. April 5 in Heydel Hall, located inside Austin Peay’s Art + Design Building.
The evening is funded by the Roy Acuff Chair of Excellence and will feature Goudsouzian in a live reading, followed by a public Q&A session and a book signing. This event is free and open to the public, with light refreshments served. Copies of Goudsouzian’s books will be available for purchase.
Goudsouzian is the Bizot Family Professor of History at the University of Memphis. His research includes 20th century American history, with a particular focus on race, politics and culture. Most of his books and articles have examined the era of the civil rights movement from a variety of angles, though his most recent book is on the presidential election of 1968, and he is pursuing some projects in U.S. sports history.
During this reading and Q&A, Goudsouzian will discuss his collaboration with illustrator Bill Murray to create “Man on a Mission,” an illustrated graphic history of James Meredith, the first Black American to attend The University of Mississippi in the early 1960s during the Jim Crow era.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Amy Wright at wrighta@apsu.edu.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Victoria Chang on March 22, from 7-9 p.m. in Heydel Hall, located inside the APSU Art + Design building.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) at Austin Peay State University will host bestselling author Bonnie Jo Campbell on February 15 from 7:00pm – 9:00pm in Art & Design room 120.
Join us for a poetry reading by APSU alums Alexa Doran, Chris Hayes, and Victoria Moore! These talented writers will also join our workshop on September 15th.
Zone 3’s Annual Broadside Competition is on a brief hiatus, but it will return soon!
We are excited to announce that judge Wendy S. Walters has selected Erin Langner’s Souvenirs from Paradise as the winner of our 2021 Creative Nonfiction Book Award!
Zone 3 is excited to announce the winners of its annual literary awards in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction: Gemini Wahhaj, Juleen Eun Sun Johnson, and Gwendolyn Paradice.
Writer, educator and spoken word poet Sarah Kay will bring her engaging performance style to Austin Peay State University through a live virtual appearance at 8 p.m. CST on Thursday, Oct. 7.
Poets Paige Lewis, Komal Mathew, and Emily Spencer will present a virtual reading of their poetry on Sept. 16 for Zone 3 Press’s First Book Award Poetry Reading.
On a May afternoon in 2013, Barry Kitterman stood inside the Mable Larson Gallery of the Harned Building, celebrating the end of the semester with colleagues and students.
Nova Cypress Black Wins the 2020 Broadside Competition
Join us for a reading with Diana Khoi Nguyen on February 4, 2021 at 7:30 CST via Zoom Webinar. Click this link to register. This event is hosted by Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at Austin Peay State University.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Darius Atefat-Peckham, Kathryn Nuernberger, and Heather Turbeville.
We are beyond excited to announce the co-winners of our 2020 Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Judge Paige Lewis selected East Walnut Hills: A Gothic Epic by Emily Spencer and For Daughters Who Walk Out Like Sons by Komal Mathew! These books will be published in fall 2021.
Zone 3 is happy to host another reading, featuring Bill Konigsberg, on October 14 at 7 PM CDT!
We are pleased to announce the second annual Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and The Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man is available now! Read an excerpt HERE. Purchase it HERE. What others are saying:
“Psalm 8” by Julie Swarstad Johnson was the winner of our 2019 Broadside Competition, and the broadside edition is now available for purchase.
Upcoming Reading Alert! Zone 3 Press is happy to be hosting its first reading of the semester on September 10 at 7 PM, welcoming Sarah Kasbeer and Alice Bolin as the featured panelists.
At Zone 3 Press and Zone 3 journal we stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.
Cathryn Hankla will present her work Thursday, Feb. 6th, at 8 PM in the Art & Design Building, Heydel Hall (Room 120) as part of the Zone 3 Reading Series. A reception and book signing will follow. This event is free and open to the public.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests.
Join us for a reading with Patty Crane and Jenn Givhan in celebration of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Crane’s manuscript, Bell I Wake To, was selected by judge Jenn Givhan as winner of this contest. A book signing and reception will follow the reading. All Zone 3 Reading Series events are free and open to the public.
We are pleased to announce the first ever Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and the Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
As part of the Zone 3 Reading series, Margaret Renkl will visit APSU to read from her new book, Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss, on Wednesday, September 11. The reading will take place in room 120 of the Art & Design building and will begin at 8 p.m. A reception and book signing will follow the event.
We are happy to announce that judge Alice Bolin has selected Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man as winner of the 2019 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Sarah will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2020.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Randal O’Wain for his story “Hallelujah Station” (Fall 2018); Ethan Chua for his poem “Immigrant Prayer” (Spring 2018); and Carrie Shipers for her essay “Mea Culpa, My Monster” (Fall 2018).
We are happy to announce that judge Jenn Givhan has selected Patty Crane’s BELL I WAKE TO as the 2018 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award for Poetry! Patty will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2019.
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at APSU will be hosting a reading by Steve Yarbrough in the Margaret Fort Trahern Laboratory Theater.
Former Zone 3 editor Blas Falconer is the author of multiple books, including Forgive the Body This Failure, The Foundling Wheel, A Questions of Gravity and Light, and The Perfect Hour. Falconer teaches in the MFA program at San Diego State University. To learn more, visit blasfalconer.com.
As we close out the year and our reading period, Zone 3 editors reminisce on the past year.
Zone 3 Press and the APSU Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host a reading by writer Eric LeMay on March 1 @ 4:00 pm in the Art & Design Building, room 120. A reception and book signing will follow the reading.
Carrie Meadows is author of Speak, My Tongue (Calypso Editions, 2017), a poetry collection celebrating self-taught artists of the American South.
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00. This year’s readers are Hannah Boyd, Tim Donahoo, Caleb Ervin, Arizona Hurn, Barry Kitterman & Allison Parker. Music by Chuck Emery. A $5 donation for the APSU Food Pantry is requested at the door.
We are happy to announce that judge Janisse Ray has selected Kelly Beard’s memoir, AN IMPERFECT RAPTURE, as the 2017 winner of the Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Kelly will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2018.
On October 26, 2017 at 4 pm in the APSU Art & Design Building, Room 120, Stephanie Dugger, an alumna of Austin Peay, will read from her new book, Either Way, You’re Done (Sundress Publications, 2017). Her chapbook, Sterling (Paper Nautilus, 2015), won the Vella Chapbook contest. She teaches at Austin Peay State University and is Assistant Poetry Editor for Zone 3 literary journal.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: Dan Beachy-Quick, for his essay “, Even” (Spring 2017); A.D. Lauren, for her poem “Hermeneutics of a 21-year-old’s Death” (Fall 2017); and Yuly Restrepo, for her story “Morocho” (Spring 2017).
Cait Weiss Orcutt and Douglas Kearney will give a reading from their work on October 5, 2017 at 8pm.
STEVEN SHERRILL has been making trouble with words since 8th grade, when he was suspended from school for two weeks for a story he wrote.
DOROTHY ALLISON, recipient of the 2016-17 Acuff Chair of Excellence, will give a reading from her work on April 7, 2017 at 8 pm in the APSU Mabry Concert Hall.
ERIK ANDERSON won the 2015 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award for his collection of essays, FLUTTER POINT (Zone 3 Press, March 15, 2017). AMY FUSSELMAN is a writer, editor, and publisher based in New York City.
We are happy to announce that judge Douglas Kearney has selected Cait Weiss Orcutt’s collection VALLEYSPEAK as the 2016 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award. Cait will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2017. Congratulations, Cait!
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00.
Zone 3 Press is pleased to announce that Erik Anderson’s forthcoming collection of essays, Flutter Point, is now available for preorder. Erik’s manuscript was selected by Amy Fusselman
ZONE 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: David Huddle, for his essay “Verbal Binary Presence in Early Childhood Development, that Infamously Difficult Poetic Form the Villanelle, and the Spiritual Quotidian” (Fall 2016); James Braziel, for his story “Shiner” (Spring 2016); and Erinn Batykefer, for her poem “Two Bees” (Spring 2016).
A reading to celebrate Zone 3’s 30th anniversary featuring Dustin Parsons, Gary McDowell & Caitlin McGuire
Allison is the author of the poetry collection The Women Who Hate Me: Poems 1980–1990
Reading Features Andrea Spofford, Amy Wright, and Barry Kitterman
Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of three poetry collections: Lucky Fish (2011), winner of the gold medal in poetry from the Independent Publisher Book Awards and the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize for Independent Books; At the Drive-in Volcano (2007), winner of the Balcones Prize; and Miracle Fruit (2003), winner of Tupelo Press Prize, ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year Award, the Global Filipino Award and finalist for the Glasgow Prize and the Asian American Literary Award.
Iconoclast reviews Z3’s Fall 2015 issue, calling it “the right mix of the literary and the accessible, the intimate and the grand.”
Zone 3 Press is proud to announce Museum of Distance, the first collection of works from poet Ashley Seitz Kramer.
The Spring 2016 issue of Zone 3 opens without preface or fanfare, allowing the writing to speak for itself.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn.– Austin Peay State University Associate Professor of Creative Writing Dr. Amy Wright is preparing for a busy 2016, as the poet, author and teacher will publish four collections of her writing, including her fifth chapbook, “Wherever The Land Is.”
We are excited to welcome our esteemed alumni back to Austin Peay for a reading at The Trahern Gallery. Join us at 4:00pm to hear Raven
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Destiny Birdsong, a renowned novelist, poet, and essayist, at 7
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Toni Jensen, a renowned prose author and professor, on Thursday, February 19, 2026 in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Jensen’s work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Jenny Molberg, an award-winning poet whose work has appeared in publications across the country, on Thursday, Nov. 13, in Art + Design Room 120 at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Molberg’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Join Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts in hosting Pulitzer Prize finalist Rebecca Makkai at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 18, in the Mabry Concert Hall at Austin Peay State University. This event is free and open to the public, featuring a live reading of Makkai’s creative work with a Q&A and book signing to follow. Light refreshments will be served.
Rebecca Makkai is a Chicago-based author holding the 2025-26 Acuff Chair of Excellence and will also read at this spring’s Zone 3 Writers’ Festival (April 16-18, 2026). Makkai honors country music legend Roy Acuff as a distinguished author of the New York Times bestselling I Have Some Questions For You, as well as four other works of fiction. Makkai was a finalist for both the 2019 Pulitzer Prize and the 2018 National Book Award and she is the winner of the ALA Carnegie Medal and the LA Times Book Prize. Her short stories have been anthologized in The Pushcart Prize XLI in 2017 among many others. Makkai continues her work as a graduate fiction teacher at Middlebury College, Northwestern University, and the Bennington Writing Seminars.
The Zone 3 Visiting Writers Series, the Betty Joe Wallace Memorial Lecture, and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA, or “seek-ah”) will host a free public event with McArthur Genius Fellow Kiese Laymon at 7 p.m. on Thursday, March 20, in Mabry Concert Hall. The nationally acclaimed author will read from and discuss his life and work, followed by a Q&A session and book signing. Read more here.
Kiese Laymon is a Black southern writer from Jackson, Mississippi. Laymon is the Libbie Shearn Moody Professor of English and Creative Writing at Rice University. Laymon is the author of Long Division, which won the 2022 NAACP Image Award for fiction, and the essay collection, How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America, named a notable book of 2021 by the New York Times critics. Laymon’s bestselling memoir, Heavy: An American Memoir, won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, the Christopher Isherwood Prize for Autobiographical Prose, the Barnes and Noble Discovery Award, the Austen Riggs Erikson Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media, and was named one of the 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years by The New York Times. The audiobook, read by the author, was named the Audible 2018 Audiobook of the Year. Laymon is the recipient of 2020-2021 Radcliffe Fellowship at Harvard. Laymon is at work on the books, Good God, and City Summer, Country Summer, and a number of other film and television projects. He is the founder of The Catherine Coleman Literary Arts and Justice Initiative, a program based out of the Margaret Walker Center at Jackson State University, aimed at aiding young people in Jackson get more comfortable reading, writing, revising and sharing on their on their own terms, in their own communities. He is the co-host of Reckon True Stories with Deesha Philyaw. Kiese Laymon was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2022.
This casual event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Andrea Spofford at spofforda@apsu.edu. For questions about Zone 3 and its events, you can email zone3@apsu.edu.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Rigoberto González reads from his memoir, Abuela in Shadow, Abuela in Light, Thursday, April 4 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building, room 120, at Austin Peay State University.
Standing over two graves, Rigoberto González studies the names “Ramon” and “María” under the family name “González.” “She was María Carrillo, not María González,” he thinks. His grandmother is missing. So begins González’s memoir, a journey to recover a more complete picture of his grandmother, who raised him following his mother’s death. This memoir unveils the hidden lives that even those we love best can hide from us.
Rigoberto González is a distinguished professor of English and director of the MFA program in creative writing at Rutgers University-Newark, and is the author of eighteen books of poetry and prose. Recipient of the PEN/Voelcker Award, the Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award, and Lannan, Guggenheim, USA Rolón, and NEA fellowships, he was the finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for a previous memoir, What Drowns the Flowers in Your Mouth.
Join us as Austin Peay alumni, Joanna Grisham and Sugar Le Fae, read from their most recently published work on Thursday, February 22, 2024 at 7:00 PM in room 120 of the Art + Design building!
There will be a Q&A session, a book signing, and a giveaway after the reading. This event is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be served.
This event is sponsored by the Center for Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) and the APSU Languages and Literature Department.
Our 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, is now available for order!
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts are very excited to host a reading with L. S. McKee and Tiana Clark. This reading celebrates the launch of McKee’s debut poetry collection, Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry judged by author Tiana Clark.
Join us for some poetry and light refreshments on Thursday, October 12 at 7:00 PM. This event is free and open to the public, and it will be hosted in the Art + Design building on Austin Peay’s campus.
In Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, through a series of narrative and lyric poems, we follow the central protagonist, Alva, as she grapples with heartbreak, desire, mortality and her search for love in a world where both Nature and relationships are increasingly shaped by technology. From the desert to MRI machines to online dating to the Large Hadron Collider to the flora and fauna of natural and imagined worlds, Alva seeks meaning and the keys to human connection.
Join the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts as author Joe Milan reads from his debut novel, The All-American, this Thursday, September 14 at 7 PM in the Art + Design building at Austin Peay State University.
In a reverse of the American immigrant novel, The All-American follows Bucky, a Korean American high school senior whose real name no one can pronounce. Never knowing his mother and abandoned by his father, Bucky grows up in a rural Washington trailer park dreaming of playing college football. However, his football dreams are snuffed out as the U.S. government deports him and the South Korean government conscripts him. With this, Bucky confronts the fact that how he sees himself is not how others see him.
Joe Milan Jr. is a second-generation Korean American and taught in South Korea for nine years. An assistant professor of creative writing at Waldorf University, he lives in Forest City, Iowa.
The Zone 3 2022 First Book Award winner, L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine, will launch October 1, 2023, but you can pre-order your copy now here. Orders will ship in early October.
We are excited to announce that judge Tiana Clark has selected L.S. McKee’s Creature, Wing, Heart, Machine as the winner of our 2022 First Book Award in Poetry. McKee will receive $1,000 and her book will be published in fall 2023.
L.S. McKee’s writing has appeared in Narrative, The Massachusetts Review, Best New Poets, Cincinnati Review, The Georgia Review, Copper Nickel, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Maryland and was a Wallace Stegner Fellow in poetry at Stanford University. Originally from East Tennessee, she is a lecturer at MIT and lives in the Boston area.
You can find more information about L.S. McKee at www.lsmckee.com
Sincerest thanks to our readers, to final judge Tiana Clark, and to all who submitted to this year’s contest.
Photo credit: Stephanie Alvarez Ewens
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Aram Goudsouzian from 7-9 p.m. April 5 in Heydel Hall, located inside Austin Peay’s Art + Design Building.
The evening is funded by the Roy Acuff Chair of Excellence and will feature Goudsouzian in a live reading, followed by a public Q&A session and a book signing. This event is free and open to the public, with light refreshments served. Copies of Goudsouzian’s books will be available for purchase.
Goudsouzian is the Bizot Family Professor of History at the University of Memphis. His research includes 20th century American history, with a particular focus on race, politics and culture. Most of his books and articles have examined the era of the civil rights movement from a variety of angles, though his most recent book is on the presidential election of 1968, and he is pursuing some projects in U.S. sports history.
During this reading and Q&A, Goudsouzian will discuss his collaboration with illustrator Bill Murray to create “Man on a Mission,” an illustrated graphic history of James Meredith, the first Black American to attend The University of Mississippi in the early 1960s during the Jim Crow era.
For questions or more information about the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, visit www.apsu.edu/ceca or email Dr. Amy Wright at wrighta@apsu.edu.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Austin Peay State University Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host author Victoria Chang on March 22, from 7-9 p.m. in Heydel Hall, located inside the APSU Art + Design building.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – The Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts (CECA) at Austin Peay State University will host bestselling author Bonnie Jo Campbell on February 15 from 7:00pm – 9:00pm in Art & Design room 120.
Join us for a poetry reading by APSU alums Alexa Doran, Chris Hayes, and Victoria Moore! These talented writers will also join our workshop on September 15th.
Zone 3’s Annual Broadside Competition is on a brief hiatus, but it will return soon!
We are excited to announce that judge Wendy S. Walters has selected Erin Langner’s Souvenirs from Paradise as the winner of our 2021 Creative Nonfiction Book Award!
Zone 3 is excited to announce the winners of its annual literary awards in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction: Gemini Wahhaj, Juleen Eun Sun Johnson, and Gwendolyn Paradice.
Writer, educator and spoken word poet Sarah Kay will bring her engaging performance style to Austin Peay State University through a live virtual appearance at 8 p.m. CST on Thursday, Oct. 7.
Poets Paige Lewis, Komal Mathew, and Emily Spencer will present a virtual reading of their poetry on Sept. 16 for Zone 3 Press’s First Book Award Poetry Reading.
On a May afternoon in 2013, Barry Kitterman stood inside the Mable Larson Gallery of the Harned Building, celebrating the end of the semester with colleagues and students.
Nova Cypress Black Wins the 2020 Broadside Competition
Join us for a reading with Diana Khoi Nguyen on February 4, 2021 at 7:30 CST via Zoom Webinar. Click this link to register. This event is hosted by Zone 3 Press and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at Austin Peay State University.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Darius Atefat-Peckham, Kathryn Nuernberger, and Heather Turbeville.
We are beyond excited to announce the co-winners of our 2020 Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Judge Paige Lewis selected East Walnut Hills: A Gothic Epic by Emily Spencer and For Daughters Who Walk Out Like Sons by Komal Mathew! These books will be published in fall 2021.
Zone 3 is happy to host another reading, featuring Bill Konigsberg, on October 14 at 7 PM CDT!
We are pleased to announce the second annual Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and The Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man is available now! Read an excerpt HERE. Purchase it HERE. What others are saying:
“Psalm 8” by Julie Swarstad Johnson was the winner of our 2019 Broadside Competition, and the broadside edition is now available for purchase.
Upcoming Reading Alert! Zone 3 Press is happy to be hosting its first reading of the semester on September 10 at 7 PM, welcoming Sarah Kasbeer and Alice Bolin as the featured panelists.
At Zone 3 Press and Zone 3 journal we stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement.
Cathryn Hankla will present her work Thursday, Feb. 6th, at 8 PM in the Art & Design Building, Heydel Hall (Room 120) as part of the Zone 3 Reading Series. A reception and book signing will follow. This event is free and open to the public.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests.
Join us for a reading with Patty Crane and Jenn Givhan in celebration of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award in Poetry. Crane’s manuscript, Bell I Wake To, was selected by judge Jenn Givhan as winner of this contest. A book signing and reception will follow the reading. All Zone 3 Reading Series events are free and open to the public.
We are pleased to announce the first ever Zone 3 Press Broadside Competition. This competition is a collaboration between Zone 3 Press and the Goldsmith Press & Rare Type Collection of Austin Peay State University.
As part of the Zone 3 Reading series, Margaret Renkl will visit APSU to read from her new book, Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss, on Wednesday, September 11. The reading will take place in room 120 of the Art & Design building and will begin at 8 p.m. A reception and book signing will follow the event.
We are happy to announce that judge Alice Bolin has selected Sarah Kasbeer’s A Woman, a Plan, an Outline of a Man as winner of the 2019 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Sarah will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2020.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of its annual fiction, poetry, and nonfiction contests: Randal O’Wain for his story “Hallelujah Station” (Fall 2018); Ethan Chua for his poem “Immigrant Prayer” (Spring 2018); and Carrie Shipers for her essay “Mea Culpa, My Monster” (Fall 2018).
We are happy to announce that judge Jenn Givhan has selected Patty Crane’s BELL I WAKE TO as the 2018 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award for Poetry! Patty will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2019.
Zone 3 and the Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts at APSU will be hosting a reading by Steve Yarbrough in the Margaret Fort Trahern Laboratory Theater.
Former Zone 3 editor Blas Falconer is the author of multiple books, including Forgive the Body This Failure, The Foundling Wheel, A Questions of Gravity and Light, and The Perfect Hour. Falconer teaches in the MFA program at San Diego State University. To learn more, visit blasfalconer.com.
As we close out the year and our reading period, Zone 3 editors reminisce on the past year.
Zone 3 Press and the APSU Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts will host a reading by writer Eric LeMay on March 1 @ 4:00 pm in the Art & Design Building, room 120. A reception and book signing will follow the reading.
Carrie Meadows is author of Speak, My Tongue (Calypso Editions, 2017), a poetry collection celebrating self-taught artists of the American South.
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00. This year’s readers are Hannah Boyd, Tim Donahoo, Caleb Ervin, Arizona Hurn, Barry Kitterman & Allison Parker. Music by Chuck Emery. A $5 donation for the APSU Food Pantry is requested at the door.
We are happy to announce that judge Janisse Ray has selected Kelly Beard’s memoir, AN IMPERFECT RAPTURE, as the 2017 winner of the Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award! Kelly will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2018.
On October 26, 2017 at 4 pm in the APSU Art & Design Building, Room 120, Stephanie Dugger, an alumna of Austin Peay, will read from her new book, Either Way, You’re Done (Sundress Publications, 2017). Her chapbook, Sterling (Paper Nautilus, 2015), won the Vella Chapbook contest. She teaches at Austin Peay State University and is Assistant Poetry Editor for Zone 3 literary journal.
Zone 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: Dan Beachy-Quick, for his essay “, Even” (Spring 2017); A.D. Lauren, for her poem “Hermeneutics of a 21-year-old’s Death” (Fall 2017); and Yuly Restrepo, for her story “Morocho” (Spring 2017).
Cait Weiss Orcutt and Douglas Kearney will give a reading from their work on October 5, 2017 at 8pm.
STEVEN SHERRILL has been making trouble with words since 8th grade, when he was suspended from school for two weeks for a story he wrote.
DOROTHY ALLISON, recipient of the 2016-17 Acuff Chair of Excellence, will give a reading from her work on April 7, 2017 at 8 pm in the APSU Mabry Concert Hall.
ERIK ANDERSON won the 2015 Zone 3 Press Creative Nonfiction Book Award for his collection of essays, FLUTTER POINT (Zone 3 Press, March 15, 2017). AMY FUSSELMAN is a writer, editor, and publisher based in New York City.
We are happy to announce that judge Douglas Kearney has selected Cait Weiss Orcutt’s collection VALLEYSPEAK as the 2016 winner of the Zone 3 Press First Book Award. Cait will receive $1,000, and her book will be published in the fall of 2017. Congratulations, Cait!
A meal of homemade soups and bread, prepared by faculty members in the Department of Languages & Literature, will be served at 6:00, followed by a reading at 7:00.
Zone 3 Press is pleased to announce that Erik Anderson’s forthcoming collection of essays, Flutter Point, is now available for preorder. Erik’s manuscript was selected by Amy Fusselman
ZONE 3 is pleased to announce the winners of our annual nonfiction, fiction, and poetry contests: David Huddle, for his essay “Verbal Binary Presence in Early Childhood Development, that Infamously Difficult Poetic Form the Villanelle, and the Spiritual Quotidian” (Fall 2016); James Braziel, for his story “Shiner” (Spring 2016); and Erinn Batykefer, for her poem “Two Bees” (Spring 2016).
A reading to celebrate Zone 3’s 30th anniversary featuring Dustin Parsons, Gary McDowell & Caitlin McGuire
Allison is the author of the poetry collection The Women Who Hate Me: Poems 1980–1990
Reading Features Andrea Spofford, Amy Wright, and Barry Kitterman
Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of three poetry collections: Lucky Fish (2011), winner of the gold medal in poetry from the Independent Publisher Book Awards and the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize for Independent Books; At the Drive-in Volcano (2007), winner of the Balcones Prize; and Miracle Fruit (2003), winner of Tupelo Press Prize, ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year Award, the Global Filipino Award and finalist for the Glasgow Prize and the Asian American Literary Award.
Iconoclast reviews Z3’s Fall 2015 issue, calling it “the right mix of the literary and the accessible, the intimate and the grand.”
Zone 3 Press is proud to announce Museum of Distance, the first collection of works from poet Ashley Seitz Kramer.
The Spring 2016 issue of Zone 3 opens without preface or fanfare, allowing the writing to speak for itself.
CLARKSVILLE, Tenn.– Austin Peay State University Associate Professor of Creative Writing Dr. Amy Wright is preparing for a busy 2016, as the poet, author and teacher will publish four collections of her writing, including her fifth chapbook, “Wherever The Land Is.”
We are excited to welcome our esteemed alumni back to Austin Peay for a reading at The Trahern Gallery. Join us at 4:00pm to hear Raven