Anthony Yarbrough // Editor-in-Chief

Anthony Yarbrough is a writer from Los Angeles and a third-year MFA student at the University of New Mexico. His fiction and nonfiction explore memory, sexuality, substance abuse, introspection, weather and cottagecore. He’s excited to rejoin the Blue Mesa Review team as its Editor-In-Chief.

Gwyneth Henke // Managing Editor

Gwyneth Henke (she/her) is a second-year MFA candidate in fiction at UNM. She graduated with a degree in religious studies at Washington University in St. Louis and worked in interfaith relations before joining the MFA. Her fiction writing explores conversion, doubt, faith, ritual, and desire. She loves to read Haruki Murakami, Michael Ondaatje, Elena Ferrante, Mieko Kawakami, and Zadie Smith.

Kyndall Benning // Associate Editor

Kyndall Benning is a writer from Edmond, Oklahoma. She is a third year MFA candidate in Nonfiction at the University of New Mexico. Her essays focus mainly on complex relationships, especially familial, in additions to topics on class and place. In addition to nonfiction, she likes working in fiction and poetry. When she isn’t writing, she likes spending time with her loved ones, including her cat, Feathers. She also enjoys oil painting and scuba diving when she has time. She’s looking forward to rejoining the BMR team as the Associate editor.

Amy Dotson // Poetry Editor

Amy Dotson is a writer from all over Kentucky. She is a second-year MFA student working on fiction, but she also writes creative nonfiction and poetry. Her work tends to deal with class, places affected by political neglect, and the strangeness of the quotidian. Like many twenty-somethings, she has recently gotten really into rock climbing.

Kani Aniegboka // Creative Nonfiction Editor

Kani Aniegboka is an MFA student at the University of New Mexico, a TinHouse summer camp participant and is currently working on his first memoir. A few years ago, he engaged in both occupational and geographical changes that he’s yet to recover from, but which have left him viewing the world with infant-like fascination once again. Kani enjoys reading culturally rich stories that question normativity.

Joe Byrne // Fiction Editor

Joe Byrne was born in Colorado Springs but grew up in New Mexico. He is a second year MFA student at UNM and the incoming fiction editor for BMR. When he's not reading or writing, he enjoys launching projectiles and listening to death metal.

Marisa P. Clark // Faculty Advisor

Marisa P. Clark (she/her) grew up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, came out in Atlanta, Georgia, and relocated to beautiful New Mexico in 1998. She holds a PhD in fiction-writing from Georgia State University and an MA in American literature and a BS in psychology from the University of Southern Mississippi. Now in her 24th year of working at UNM, she has taught all genres of undergraduate creative writing, queer texts and other literature courses, first- and second-year composition courses, and ESL, along with taking on various roles with Blue Mesa Review. Her prose and poetry appear in numerous print and online journals. Best American Essays 2011 recognized her creative nonfiction among its Notable Essays, and she serves as a senior fiction reader for New England Review. She has also worked as a librarian at the Centers for Disease Control, a copy designer and proofreader in graphics and advertising, a bookshop clerk, and a clerical assistant at a law office.

GRADUATE READERS 

Jeanette DeDios
Julie Peterman
Rebecca "RJ" Smith

 

 

UNDERGRADUATE READERS 

Mia CasasShona Casey
Evan D. Chilton-Garcia
Bruce Chrisp
Alexandra Dark
Robert "Wes" Dyer
Carter Gage
Katrina Gilbert
Jordan Lenz
Emilia Madrid
Sophia Puglia-Henry
Savina Romero