Announcing the 2023 class of Periplus fellows.

Lit Hub is pleased to announce the 2023 class of Periplus Fellows, selected from a pool of more than 500 applicants. This year, Periplus awarded a total of 55 mentorships to writers of color living and working in the United States, pairing each one with a member of the collective. Here’s a bit from Periplus on the origins, present, and future of the group:

The Periplus Collective began in 2021 as a group of about 50 writers who, having benefited when we’ve belonged to diverse and inclusive writing communities, came together to mentor promising writers in the United States who were earlier in their careers than we were. There was no money involved. It wasn’t a nonprofit. Everybody was a volunteer. It was to be a collective, which meant it would be what we together made it—with our time, talent, and efforts.

As we start our third year, Periplus has become much more than we’d anticipated. Originally, Periplus was envisioned purely as a decentralized mentoring program, but it has evolved over the years as the mentors and fellows have together built a community and shared resources. Today, Periplus has several pillars. There’s the mentor-fellow relationship, still at the center. But we now also have mentor-organized talks and panels; opportunities for craft and career development from inside and out (such as fellowships offered to the collective, in recent years, from StoryStudio and Catapult); and the community among fellows, which is nurtured, for example, through game nights, in-person get togethers, an AMA series featuring mentors and Fellows, Discord channels, and a Fellow-led Periplus anthology that’s currently in progress.

The lines between mentor and Fellow are increasingly blurred, too, with Fellows adding to the collective wisdom and experience as much as mentors. And this year, a 2021 Fellow, Zain Khalid, will be mentoring as well, after having published his debut novel, Brother Alive, last year.

The list of 2023 Fellows is below; read their full bios here.

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Alixen Pham will be working with Diana Khoi Nguyen.

Andres Cordoba will be working with Andrés Cerpa.

Ashley Hughes will be working with Laura van den Berg.

Autumn Fourkiller will be working with Kelli Jo Ford.

Belinda Bruner will be working with Sarah Perry.

benedict nguyễn will be working with Andrea Lawlor.

Brian Truong will be working with Alex Marzano-Lesnevich.

Celeste Chan will be working with Esmé Wang.

Charles Stephens will be working with Yalitza Ferreras.

Christopher Louis Romaguera will be working with Dariel Suarez.

Christopher R. Alonso will be working with James Han Mattson.

Constance Collier-Mercado will be working with Dustin Pearson.

Dan Truong will be working with C Pam Zhang.

Dariana D. Guerrero will be working with Maceo Montoya.

Dequan Gambrell will be working with Maurice Carlos Ruffin.

Dey Rivers will be working with Kim Coleman Foote.

DW McKinney will be working with Sejal Shah.

Francisco Uribe will be working with Derek Palacio.

Goeun Park will be working with R.O. Kwon.

Greg Luna will be working with Kirstin Valdez Quade.

Hana Rivers will be working with Melissa Chadburn.

Jaime Estepa will be working with Randall Mann.

Jasmine Knowles will be working with Jenny Sadre-Orafai.

Jasmine Ledesma will be working with Mary-Kim Arnold.

Jen Shin will be working with Jami Nakamura Lin.

jo xi chen will be working with Anna Qu.

Johnny Costello will be working with Daniel Peña.

Karen Mok will be working with Rachel Khong.

Kimberly Rooney 高小荣 will be working with Nicole Chung.

Kivel Carson will be working with Deesha Philyaw.

Kyla Walker will be working with Hilary Leichter.

Laura Andrea will be working with Erica Mena.

Lila Hassan will be working with Alexis Okeowo.

Lyndon Nicholas will be working with Bryan Washington.

Miacel Spotted Elk will be working with Lauren Markham.

Michel Ge will be working with Gene Kwak.

Monica Kim will be working with Joseph Han.

Monterica Sadé Neil will be working with E.M. Tran.

Nathan Xie will be working with A.E. Osworth.

noam keim will be working with Grace Talusan.

Omaria Sanchez Pratt will be working with Denne Michele Norris.

Phillipe Roberts will be working with E. Alex Jung.

Raia Small will be working with Vauhini Vara.

Rocio Franco will be working with Kemi Alabi.

Roland Jackson will be working with Mimi Lok.

Rosa Cartagena will be working with Carina del Valle Schorske.

Saira Khan will be working with Zain Khalid.

Samina Saifee will be working with Zeyn Joukhadar.

Sara Montijo will be working with Ingrid Rojas Contreras.

Shamecca Harris will be working with Nadia Owusu.

Soyini Ayanna Forde will be working with Adrienne Raphel.

Tamara Love will be working with Jennine Capó Crucet.

Vida James will be working with Cleyvis Natera.

Whitney Washington will be working with Angelica Jade Bastién.

Yan Pu will be working with Libby Flores.