The Iowa Writers’ Workshop graduate returns to campus Oct. 23 to discuss her acclaimed memoir, Things in Nature Merely Grow.

Check out the latest must-read titles from the Writing University.

Nicholas Boggs, a writer and assistant professor of English and creative writing at Stony Brook University in Stony Brook, New York, has been selected as the 2026 recipient of the Truman Capote Literary Trust Award for Literary Criticism in Memory of Newton Arvin.

Poet Brenda Hillman, who earned an MFA from the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop in 1976, is a 2026 finalist for the prestigious National Book Award.

The Iowa Writers’ Workshop alumnus and associate professor brings a unique approach to fiction and a commitment to helping students develop their own artistic voices.

Tony Tulathimutte went from an unhappy career in Silicon Valley to the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Now the acclaimed writer is helping University of Iowa students envision their own paths forward.

A Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and one of the most influential figures in the history of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Robinson shaped a generation of writers over her 25-year tenure as the F. Wendell Miller Professor of English and Creative Writing.

Christopher Merrill has been named the 15th recipient of the Paul Engle Prize, presented by the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature organization.

Award-winning author and Iowa Writers’ Workshop graduate Tony Tulathimutte is the inaugural recipient of the Jack Galef Literary Arts Award. Tulathimutte is a visiting faculty member in residence at the workshop this fall.