Announcing the forthcoming publication of I Could Name God in Twelve Ways (The University Press of Kentucky) by Arts & Letters’ past Prose Editor Karen Salyer McElmurray.
Award-winning writer Karen Salyer McElmurray details her life’s journey across continents and decades in a poetic collection that is equal parts essay-as-memoir, memoir-as-Künstlerroman, and travelogue-as-meditation.
It is about the deserts of India. A hospital ward in Maryland. The blue seas of Greece. A greenhouse in Virginia. It is about the spirit houses of Thailand. The mountains of eastern Kentucky. The depths of the Grand Canyon. A creative writing classroom in Georgia. An attic in a generations-old house. It is about coming to terms with both memory and the power of writing itself.
— University Press of Kentucky
I Could Name God in Twelve Ways, Karen Salyer McElmurray’s newest essay collection, is available for pre-order and set for publication September 10, 2024.
Memoir is a difficult act….It speaks toward the truth, although it may never, ever uncover the deepest part of what is hidden. — Karen Salyer McElmurray, I Could Name God in Twelve Ways
Karen Salyer McElmurray is the author of Wanting Radiance: A Novel. Her memoir Surrendered Child: A Birth Mother’s Journey is a National Book Critics Circle Notable Book and winner of the AWP Award Series for Creative Nonfiction. She has received numerous awards, including the Annie Dillard Prize, the New Southerner Literary Prize, the Orison Anthology Award, a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, and multiple notable mentions in Best American Essays. She is a visiting writer and lecturer at various programs and reading series across the United States.
If you’d like to learn more about I Could Name God in Twelve Ways, including what writers Julie Marie Wade, James Tate Hill, and Sue William Silverman (CNF judge for Arts & Letters 2023 Annual Prizes) said about the collection: