News & Events

September 28, 2024: “Beautiful Things: Writing & Publishing Miniature Nonfiction.” 2024 Gathering of Writers (Indiana Writers Center) at the Indiana State Library. More information and tickets here!

October 28-30, 2024: The Ball State Writer-in-Residence (in the schools) program with Hena Khan. Check out the public schedule here & come out to support a program that gives books to kids!

 

Thank you @INPublicRadio for having me & our amazing guest Hena Khan on to talk about this week's writer-in-residence program @BallState. Let's go! @bsuenglish @BallStateCSH @PresidentMearns @iSmashFizzle

In a hurry? Minute twelve:

Such a lovely October-y Beautiful Thing by Joseph Gross for my fellow leaf rakers out there:
https://riverteethjournal.com/beautiful-things/jumping-in-leaves-2/

If This Were Fiction

If This Were Fiction

October 4, 2022

My new book is out! I’ve been writing essays for over fifteen years, and it’s been a glorious ride, but I’d never put out a collection of just Jill Christman essays between two covers. I’m thrilled to share the news that the good people at the University of Nebraska Press changed that on September 1, 2022 by releasing If This Were Fiction: A Love Story in their amazing American Lives series.

Order here!

Indelible

Indelible

In teaching news, Ball State honored my work with a group of students dedicated to raising awareness and providing resources around the issue of sexual violence on our nation’s campuses with a 2021 Immersive Learning Faculty Award. If you’re a member of a university community, I hope you’ll check out the details of our project at IndeliblePodcast.com …

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Past Events

July 16, 2024 (7:30-9 p.m. EST): “Can I Say This?: Writing the Hard Stuff in Personal Essays & Memoir.” Lafayette Writers Studio. 

May 29, 2024: Creative Nonfiction Workshop for the Spalding Naslund-Mann School of Writing Spring Residency. Louisville, KY.

April 25, 2024: Keynote Address for the International Association of Laboratory Schools Conference. Muncie, IN.

October 21, 2023: Workshop & Reading, LitYoungstown Fall Festival, Youngstown

July 22, 2023: Panel & Workshop, Midwest Writers Workshop, Muncie

April 29, 2023: Reading & Workshop, Quill & Ink, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale

March 8-11, 2023: AWP Conference & Bookfair, Seattle Convention Center

July 19-22, 2023: 50th Anniversary Midwest Writers Workshop, Ball State Alumni Center

January 27, 2023: English Reading Series, Brigham Young University, Salt Lake City

December 3, 2022: Reading with Katy Didden, Indy Reads, Indianapolis

November 30, 2022: Reading, Indiana University South Bend, South Bend

November 17-19, 2022: Words & Music Festival, New Orleans

November 4-6, 2022: Texas Book Festival, Austin

October 27, 2022: The Multiplicity of Voice: Sonya Huber, Jill Christman, & Jody Keisner. A Room of One’s Own bookstore.

September 14th, 2022: A Conversation with Kate Hopper at Magers & Quinn Booksellers, Minneapolis

September 15th, 2022: Reading & Slideshow hosted by Mark Ehling with Mark Neely & others, Location TBD, Minneapolis

November 17th, 2022: If This Were Fiction Reading at the Words & Music Festival, New Orleans

 

Jill Spends Time at Essay Daily

Review of Hell If We Don’t Change Our Ways

Check out my review of Brittany Means’s Hell If We Don’t Change Our Ways.

If This Were Fiction

My new book is out! I’ve been writing essays for over fifteen years, and it’s been a glorious ride, but I’d never put out a collection of just Jill Christman essays between two covers …

If This Were Fiction: A Love Story in Essays

If This Were Fiction: A Love Story in Essays

If This Were Fiction is a love story—for Jill Christman’s long-ago fiancé, who died young in a car accident; for her children; for her husband, Mark; and ultimately, for herself. In this collection, Christman takes on the wide range of situations and landscapes she encountered on her journey from wild child through wounded teen to mother, teacher, writer, and wife. Published in the American Lives series from University of Nebraska Press September 2022.

“Mr. Cosmos” at New Ohio Review

The title character of “Mr. Cosmos” is my fifth-grade science teacher from Newbury Elementary School in Massachusetts—a man so wonderful he would leap on his desk and do interpretive dances …

Spinning: Against the Rules of Angels

Spinning: Against the Rules of Angels was Creative Nonfiction Magazine’s True Story. Issue #12, 2017. For years, Jill Christman has been waiting for her long-lost lover to communicate with her from beyond the grave. Finally, he walks into her early-morning exercise class, setting her world awhirl.

Indelible

In teaching news, Ball State honored my work with a group of students dedicated to raising awareness and providing resources around the issue of sexual violence on our nation’s campuses with a 2021 Immersive Learning Faculty Award. If you’re a member of a university community, I hope you’ll check out the details of our project at IndeliblePodcast.com …

Falling

“Falling”—a longform essay—won the 2021 Iron Horse Literary Review Long Story Contest and was later released by IHLR released in a beautiful, illustrated, e-single that you can download for free. The essay’s core narrative chronicles the writer’s son’s fall from a sugar maple tree and explores how we navigate the scariest things and most profound losses.

Darkroom: A Family Exposure by Jill Christman

Darkroom: A Family Exposure

Winner of Association of Writers and Writing Programs Award for Creative Nonfiction, Darkroom: A Family Exposure is Jill Christman’s gripping, funny, and wise account of her first thirty years. Although her story runs the gamut of dramatic life events, including childhood sexual abuse, accidental death, and psychological trauma, Christman’s poignant memoir is much more than a litany of horrors; instead, it is an open-eyed, wide-hearted, and good-humored look at a life worth surviving.