By Paige Dalto ’24, associate editor
LVC’s interactive reading series, “Writing: A Life,” will welcome Sarah Cypher as this fall’s first visiting author.
Cypher, both an author and freelance editor, had her debut novel, “The Skin and Its Girl,” published in April of 2023. “The Skin and Its Girl” and many of her other works address life within the Middle East and how this impacts generations. Cypher was raised in a Lebanese Christian family and currently resides in Washington, DC, with her wife.
“When I read The Skin and Its Girl, I thought it would be a story that appealed to students for its sense of understated magic or speculation and its truths as a novel about queerness, generational connections and divides and the nature of storytelling itself,” Dr. Holly Wendt, associate professor of English and director of creative writing, said.
Cypher’s publications feature her debut novel among a multitude of short stories, essays, short fiction pieces and more. With more than 20 years of editing experience, Cypher’s visit brings significant writing and editing expertise to LVC.
She holds an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and founded her own editing business, The Threepenny Editor, which specializes in fiction, literary nonfiction and scholarly storytelling. The business runs out of Washington, DC, and was named in honor of a bookstore in Cypher’s hometown, Pittsburgh, PA.
“So many students have told me that they’d never been to a reading before attending Writing: A Life and didn’t know what to expect, and they’ve been really happily surprised to discover how much they enjoyed the experience,” Wendt added. “It’s really comforting to know, for example, that really accomplished authors also get rejected sometimes, which is totally true, and those little moments can be so freeing for a younger writer who is experiencing creative struggles or for anyone who is persevering toward a goal.”
Cypher will host her reading on campus on Sept. 25 at 7 p.m. in the Bishop Library. Cypher will conduct a generative workshop on Sept. 26 at 11 a.m. and will additionally visit creative writing courses during her time on campus.
Students who would like to sit in on the creative writing courses should contact Dr. Wendt for more information at wendt@lvc.edu.