Bio

I earned my MFA at the Rainier Writers’ Workshop in 2012, where I wrote poetry and translated poems from Russian. Since 2013, I’ve been fixated on essays and creative nonfiction. I’ve been awarded grants from Portland’s Regional Arts & Cultural Council (2023, 2016), a special mention in Pushcart Prize XLI: Best of the Small Presses (2017), and writing residencies from Storyknife Writer’s Retreat and Hypatia-in-the-Woods.

Current Projects

I’m seeking representation for a memoir, "Living for Art and Other Lies.” My memoir involves a childhood spent seeking home in the opera where my mother performed. The issue was, I kept getting cast in silent parts. After an adolescence spent watching sopranos die onstage and then watching my own precious mother struggle and die, I had to look elsewhere for home. I thought I would find it at an acting conservatory in Russia, but soon realized that no performance would get me the love I was looking for.

Singer on stage with a flute and costumed animals onstage

Me (far right) in a bear suit at age 16 in “The Magic Flute” in Washington, DC.

Newsletter

I have a Substack newsletter called The Soft Underbelly. Subscribe to join in conversations about vulnerability and maintaining a creative life. Also, I’ll include pictures of cute fuzzy bellies (not mine).

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