Kenji C. Liu
Los Angeles, CA, USA
Poetry, Creative Non-Fiction
Contact Information
About Kenji C. Liu
Kenji C. Liu is author of Monsters I Have Been (Alice James Books, 2019), finalist for the 2020 California and Maine Book Awards for poetry, and Map of an Onion, national winner of the 2015 Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize (Inlandia Institute). His poetry is in numerous journals, anthologies, magazines, and two chapbooks, Craters: A Field Guide (2017) and You Left Without Your Shoes (2009). He has consulted on manuscripts that have gone on to win an American Book Award and PEN America Literary Award.
What I've done
Monsters I Have Been (Alice James, 2019), finalist for the 2020 California and Maine Book Awards for poetry Map of an Onion (Inlandia Institute, 2016), national winner of the 2015 Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize Kundiman Poetry Fellow
Who I work with
I’m especially interested in working with poets and hybrid writers in the process of developing their manuscripts.
Offerings
- Guest lectures and craft talks
- Writing workshops
- Manuscript consultations
- Judge for literary competitions and awards
Reviews
“The manuscript for my first poetry collection, God’s Will for Monsters, was rejected 25 times. After taking a long break from submission, I worked with Kenji on reshaping the organization of my poems as a book, in addition to revising individual poems and gathering enthusiasm for another round of submission. Not only does Kenji have a keen eye for craft and poetics, he made significant connections to the sociopolitical, to world mythologies, to critical race theory, gender and queer theory, and postcolonialism in my poems, which made our conversations about my work expansive and exciting. Kenji’s line edits and feedback were intuitive, incisive and challenging; and I felt like he truly understood the aesthetics and politics of my work, which gave me another push to submit the book one more time. Shortly thereafter, my book was picked up my publisher, and won a regional poetry prize, then the American Book Award a year later.”
— Rachelle Cruz, author of God’s Will for Monsters