The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2015

by Adam Johnson

  Richard McGehee is a research fellow in the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin and works in the areas of sport literature and history. His translations of sport-related stories and poetry have appeared in Aethlon, the Southern Review, and World Literature Today.

  Inés Fernández Moreno was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She has worked as creative director of an advertising agency and written extensively for newspapers and magazines. She is the author of a number of novels and stories, and won the 2014 Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize for her novel El cielo no existe. The prize is awarded to the best novel written by a woman in Spanish. She lives in the small Buenos Aires neighborhood of Parque Chas.

  Christopher Myers was born and raised in Ohio. He worked in the poker industry in Nevada and later spent several years working in an entomology laboratory in Vermont. He has also been a teacher’s assistant and tutor at an adult high school. He is currently serving time in Lovelock, NV. Christopher Myers was awarded third place in Memoir in the 2013 PEN America Prison Writing Contest.

  U.S.-based Nigerian writer, Lesley Nneka Arimah, has received grants and awards from AWP, the Jerome Foundation, the Elizabeth George Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, and others. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in PANK, Granta, Mid-American Review, and elsewhere. She is at work on a novel and collection of short stories.

  Claudia Rankine is the author of Citizen: An American Lyric and four previous books, including Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric. She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and the winner of the Jackson Poetry Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry, and the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry.

  Paul Salopek crossed his first border at age six when his family moved to central Mexico, where he later worked as a rancher and cowhand. For years he made his living as a commercial fisherman. As a foreign correspondent, he has reported on conflicts in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and Latin America, as well as on global topics such as oil production, overfishing, and the human genome. His stories have appeared in National Geographic, the Chicago Tribune, the Atlantic, Foreign Policy, The Best American Travel Writing, and other publications. His reportage has earned many awards in the United States, including two Pulitzer Prizes; the George Polk Award; the National Press Club Award; the Overseas Press Club Award; the Daniel Pearl Award for Courage in Journalism; the Lovejoy Award for defending press freedom; a Princeton Ferris-McGraw Fellowship; and a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard.

  Leanne Shapton is a Canadian artist, author, and publisher based in New York City. She is the author of Important Artifacts . . . and Swimming Studies, winner of the 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography.

  Sarah Shourd is journalist, public speaker, playwright, editor, and a Visiting Scholar at UC Berkeley. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Beast and focuses primarily on issues pertaining to solitary confinement and the U.S. prison system. Shourd is currently based in Oakland, California and can be reached at sarahshourd.com.

  Bryan Stevenson is the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative and the author of Just Mercy, from which “The High Road” is adapted.

  Paul Tough is the author, most recently, of How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. He is a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine, where he writes mostly about education and economic mobility. His writing has also appeared in The New Yorker, Slate, GQ, and Esquire. He lives with his family in Montauk, New York.

  Wells Tower is the author of Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned, a collection of short fiction. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, the Paris Review, McSweeney’s, GQ, and elsewhere. He lives in North Carolina.

  Kawai Strong Washburn was born and raised on the Big Island of Hawai’i. He has since lived, worked, and traveled all over the world, including Sub-Saharan Africa, post-communist Europe, and Central and South America. In addition to his work as a writer, he has been a web developer, systems administrator, microfinance analyst, and English/ math/computer science teacher. His fiction has appeared in McSweeney’s, the Mid-American Review, and Barrelhouse; he has also written commentary for Flavorwire and book reviews for Publishers Weekly. He is terrible at surfing, loves his wife and daughter, and is hard at work on a novel and short story collection.

  Joan Wickersham’s most recent book of fiction is The News from Spain. Her memoir The Suicide Index was a National Book Award finalist. Her short stories have appeared in many magazines, as well as in The Best American Short Stories. She teaches in the Bennington Writing Seminars.

  Rachel Zucker is the author of nine books, most recently The Pedestrians, a double collection of poetry and prose and MOTHERs, a memoir. She teaches at NYU and lives in New York with her husband and their three sons.

  THE BEST AMERICAN NONREQUIRED READING COMMITTEE

  Behold! The bios of the Best American Nonrequired Reading (BANR) committee. These students meet on a weekly basis at McSweeney’s Publishing in San Francisco in order to read and read and then read some more. From all this reading, they select the work that ends up in this book. They are aided by a group of students in Ann Arbor, Michigan at 826 Michigan who do the exact same thing.

  Juan Chicas is a student at City College of San Francisco. He enjoyed being on the Best American Committee very much. His favorite comic book characters will always be Shazam and Moon Knight. He is the funniest guy ever to be on the committee. He is also a socialist and hopes that one day this country stops digging its own grave.

  Cosmo Comito-Steller, sixteen years old, Lowell High School: PROS: 1) Always dresses warm, 2) Can differentiate between stalagmite and stalactite, 3) Fuel-efficient, four-wheel drive. CONS: 1) Does not dot i’s, cross t’s, 2) Has failed Erik Erikson’s psychosocial stage of Ego Identity v. Role Confusion, 3) Had trouble thinking of cons.

  Milo Comito-Steller, sixteen, student at Balboa High School, is an avid reader and writer of science fiction—and other genres as well, if the mood strikes him. Raised on Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings, he now enjoys the works of Joseph Heller and Kurt Vonnegut. When he grows up, he wants to be a writer, or at least someone who writes books in his spare time.

  Claire Fishman is a freshman at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. This has been her fourth year in BANR and she is very grateful for all the enlightening and weird pieces that she has read over the years, and for all the fascinating people with whom she was able to discuss those pieces. Martin Van Buren remains her favorite president.

  Sophie Halperin is a freshman at Smith! She’s from San Francisco and graduated from Mission High School. She thought Mad Max: Fury Road was the best action movie she’s ever seen, and it made her believe in Hollywood’s potential to make great movies.

  Kelly Lee is a senior at George Washington High School. She likes people most of the time, likes math none of the time, and could always go for a burrito. She speaks softly but carries a big stick, and she has a strong desire to travel the world with her friends.

  Rita Liu is a junior at Pioneer High School. She can usually be found covered in some sort of paint, trying to coerce her friends into modeling for impromptu photo shoots, or hopped up on coffee. She adores short stories and she sometimes stares dramatically out the car window.

  Samantha Ng is a senior at June Jordan School for Equity. It’s her second year on the BANR committee and she loves reading stories in class. She also likes to practice karate. Even though she is only a yellow belt, her moves are surprisingly butt kicking.

  Marco Ponce currently attends George Washington High School where he is a senior. He likes to read and play lacrosse, and he’s interested in community organizing. His motto is: “in order to feel good you have to dress good,” and he recommends that everyone find their own motto because it’s nice to have a motto.

  Evelyn Pugh is currently a first-
year at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. In her free time she enjoys drinking mochas, watching sitcoms, and sharing groan-worthy puns. For example, what is Michelle Obama’s favorite veggie? Barokoli.

  Zola Rosenfeld is currently a sophomore at Jewish Community High School by day and a brooding vigilante by night. When not spending her Monday evenings at McSweeney’s with her posse, she protects her great city with pride and explores unmarked Pacific islands. If you should ever see her, be careful not to be blinded by her dazzling smile.

  Isaac Schott-Rosenfield is fifteen years of age, and currently majors in creative writing at the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts. He is an upstanding citizen, by which he means he is forced to stand up a lot. Really more than he’d like.

  Cynthia Van, seventeen, is a senior at George Washington High School. She is horrified by the inevitable doom of the universe and how it will affect arctic flowers. She is very close to entering the totally not-radical void of adulthood. In order to cope with this, she eats large quantities of potatoes and yam leaves.

  Grace VanRenterghem is a senior at Huron High School and has been a committee member for two years. Besides reading, her favorite past times include examining creepy bugs, drinking copious amounts of Yorkshire tea, petting her cats, and trying to sing along to Spanish songs.

  Hadley VanRenterghem is a senior at Ann Arbor Huron High School and has participated in BANR for two years. She always loves attending BANR and looks forward to another year of intriguing reading. As you may have guessed, she and Grace are identical twins, so who knows who is who in these pictures . . .

  Very special thanks to Nicole Angeloro, Clara Sankey, Daniel Handler, Mark Robinson, Eric Nyquist, Inez Tan, Nora Byrnes, and Belle Baxley. A bow and a salute for our lovely and talented intern, Taylor Stephens, whose hands played a vital role in the production of this book. And thanks also to 826 National, 826 Valencia, 826 Michigan, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, ScholarMatch, Laura Howard, Andi Winnette, Jordan Bass, Ruby Perez, Shannon Davis, Ian Delaney, Dan McKinley, Sam Riley, Sunra Thompson, Elizabeth Hanley, Cal Crosby, Casey Jarman, Zoé Kleinfeld, Mara Bandt-Law, Steve Elias, Pete Endicott, Mimi Lok, Cliff Mayotte, Claire Kiefer, Gerald Richards, Molly Parent, Lauren Hall, Olivia White Lopez, Jorge Eduardo Garcia, María Inés Montes, Bita Nazarian, Allyson Halpern, Amy Popovich, Ashley Varady, Emma Peoples, Christina V. Perry, Claudia Sanchez, and Caroline Kangas.

  NOTABLE NONREQUIRED READING OF 2014

  STEVE AMICK

  The Measuring, Zoetrope

  IAN BASSINGTHWAIGHTE

  When Trains Fall from Space, Carolina Quarterly

  MATTHEW CLARK

  Shedders, Ecotone

  LYDIA CONKLIN

  Pioneer, The Southern Review

  DIANE COOK

  The Mast Year, Granta

  BILL COTTER

  The Window Lion, The Paris Review

  MICHELLE CHIHARA

  The Bride Laid Bare by Her Bachelors Even , Santa Monica Review

  DOUG CRANDELL

  A Murder Remembered, The Sun Magazine

  SAM DOLNICK

  The Sinaloa Cartel’s 90 Year-Old Drug Mule, The New York Times Magazine

  GINGER EAGER

  Beyond the Boundaries of Flesh, Bellevue Literary Review

  CLOE FELDMAN EMISON

  US: Deceased Shopping, Salt Hill Journal

  BRIAN EVENSON

  Maternity, Ploughshares

  ANDRÉS FELIPE SOLANO

  Pig Skin, Granta

  JIM GAVIN

  The Copy Chief, Zoetrope

  AISHA GAWAD

  The Guardians of America, American Short Fiction

  LAURA HARTENBERGER

  The Canvas, subTerrain

  BEN HOFFMAN

  Reports from a Higher Roof, Zoetrope

  GEETHA IYER

  The Mongerji Letters, Salt Hill Journal

  KENDALL KLYM

  Pavlova, Hunger Mountain

  ZACHARY LAZAR

  We Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us, Brick

  HENRY W. LEUNG

  This is Not a Tourist Attraction, The Asian American Literary Review

  JILL LOGAN

  A Daughter’s Letter to Tamsen Donner, Zyzzyva

  BEN MAUK

  Stethoscope, The Sun Magazine

  ELENA MAULI SHAPIRO

  Bank Repos for Sale, Zyzzyva

  MATTHEW NEILL NULL

  The Island in the Gorge of the Great River, Ecotone

  ADAM NICOLSON

  Chasing Wolves in the American West, Granta

  SHELLY ORIA

  My Wife, in Converse, The Paris Review

  FRANCES DE PONTES PEEBLES

  The Crossing, Zoetrope

  JOHN PICARD

  The Double, Hayden’s Ferry Review

  JAMIE QUATRO

  Bedtime Story, Tin House

  ANA MARÍA SHUA

  Circus Freaks, New Orleans Review

  SARAH MOLLIE SILBERMAN

  Armor, Booth

  ROBERT UREN

  Omniplanet, Post Road Magazine

  ABOUT 826 NATIONAL

  Proceeds from this book benefit youth literacy

  A PERCENTAGE OF the cover price of this book goes to 826 National, a network of seven youth tutoring, writing, and publishing centers in seven cities around the country.

  Since the birth of 826 National in 2002, our goal has been to assist students ages 6–18 with their writing skills while helping teachers get their classes passionate about writing. We do this with a vast army of volunteers who donate their time so we can give as much one-on-one attention as possible to the students whose writing needs it. Our mission is based on the understanding that great leaps in learning can happen with one-on-one attention, and that strong writing skills are fundamental to future success.

  Through volunteer support, each of the eight 826 chapters—in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Ann Arbor, Chicago, Boston, and Washington, DC—provides drop-in tutoring, class field trips, writing workshops, and in-schools programs, all free of charge, for students, classes, and schools. 826 centers are especially committed to supporting teachers, offering services and resources for English Language Learners, and publishing student work. Each of the 826 chapters works to produce professional-quality publications written entirely by young people, to forge relationships with teachers in order to create innovative workshops and lesson plans, to inspire students to write and appreciate the written word, and to rally thousands of enthusiastic volunteers to make it all happen. By offering all of our programming for free, we aim to serve families who cannot afford to pay for the level of personalized instruction their children receive through 826 chapters.

  The demand for 826 National’s services is tremendous. Last year we worked with more than 6,000 volunteers and over 32,000 students nationally, hosted 730 field trips, completed 218 major inschools projects, offered 378 evening and weekend workshops, welcomed over nearly 200 students per day for after-school tutoring, and produced nearly 1,000 student publications. At many of our centers, our field trips are fully booked almost a year in advance, teacher requests for in-school tutor support continue to rise, and the majority of our evening and weekend workshops have waitlists.

  826 National volunteers are local community residents, professional writers, teachers, artists, college students, parents, bankers, lawyers, and retirees from a wide range of professions. These passionate individuals can be found at all of our centers after school, sitting side-by-side with our students, providing one-on-one attention. They can be found running our field trips, or helping an entire classroom of local students learn how to write a story, or assisting student writers during one of our Young Authors’ Book Programs.

  All day and in a variety of ways, our volunteers are actively connecting with youth from the communities we serve.

  To learn more or get involved, please visit:

  826 National: www.826national.org

  826 San Francisco: www.826valencia.org

>   826 New York: www.826nyc.org

  826 Los Angeles: www.826la.org

  826 Chicago: www.826chi.org

  826 Ann Arbor: www.826michigan.org

  826 Boston: www.826boston.org

  826 Washington, DC: www.826dc.org

  826 VALENCIA

  Named for the street address of the building it occupies in the heart of San Francisco’s Mission District, 826 Valencia opened on April 8, 2002 and consists of a writing lab, a street-front, student-friendly retail pirate store that partially funds its programs, and satellite classrooms in two local middle schools. 826 Valencia has developed programs that reach students at every possible opportunity—in school, after school, in the evenings, or on the weekends. Since its doors opened, over fifteen hundred volunteers—including published authors, magazine founders, SAT course instructors, documentary filmmakers, and other professionals—have donated their time to work with thousands of students. These volunteers allow the center to offer all of its services for free.