The MFA Reading Series: Corinna Vallianatos

The Creative Writing MFA Reading Series presents the award-winning author Corinna Vallianatos, described by The New York Times Book Review as a writer who “can reveal an entire life in a series of vignettes, open wide a heart with a single sentence.” Valliantos authored the novel “The Beforeland” and the short story collection “My Escapee,” named a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice (January 4, 2013). “With the spare, definitive strokes of Matisse’s late portraits, the stories in ‘My Escapee’ hew precisely to the truth, while rendering a series of expressive and particular female lives,” wrote Jhumpa Lahiri. “Read together, these stories navigate an intimate landscape of fault lines, of grottoes of emotions, of stark passages and significant crossings. Vivid, whimsical, and restrained, they introduce a mature voice, an affecting and bracing debut.” 

Vallianatos will give a reading at 7:30 PM on Friday, April 19 in The Hemingway Center, followed by a book signing. Free and open to the public, the MFA Reading Series brings renowned writers to the Boise State campus each year.

Vallianatos authored the story collection “My Escapee,” winner of the Grace Paley Prize for Short Fiction and New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, and the novel “The Beforeland.” Her third book, “Origin Stories,” is forthcoming from Graywolf Press in 2025. Her stories appear in The Best American Short Stories 2023, The Idaho Review, LitMag, McSweeney’s, A Public Space, and elsewhere. She teaches at Claremont McKenna College and lives in California and Virginia.

You can view all upcoming creative writing MFA reading events on the events page here.