Natalie Scenters-Zapico, who graduated with her MFA in 2013 has been awarded the 2017 Lannan Literary Fellowship for Poetry. The fellowship honors both established and emerging writers whose work is of exceptional quality. The awards recognize writers who have made significant contributions to English-language literature. The fellowships recognize writers of distinctive literary merit who demonstrate potential for continued outstanding work.
Scenters-Zapico is from the sister cities of El Paso, Texas, USA and Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, México. Her debut poetry collection The Verging Cities (Center for Literary Publishing, 2015) won the PEN American/Joyce Osterweil Award, the GLCA’s New Writers Award, the National Association of Chicana/o Studies Book Award, and the Utah Book Award. The Verging Cities was also featured in Poets and Writers, LitHub, and the Los Angeles Times. Her second book, Lima :: Limón is forthcoming from Copper Canyon Press. Her poetry has been published by a wide variety of poetry outlets.