Eli Hastings

I'm an author living in Seattle with my brilliant, dancing doctor wife, Lili, and nutcase toddler, Pax. I'm passionate about using writing to help at-risk youth, so I'm a team leader at PONGO TEEN WRITING. Through both my books, but especially my recent memoir, you'll see how the sorrows of mental disorder and addiction have affected my life. Because of this I've just completed clinical internship and become a Marriage and Family Therapist Associate.

Background:

* My latest book, Clearly Now, the Rain: A Memoir of Love and Other Trips, was published by ECW Press in May 2013.

* My first book, Falling Room (2006), a memoir/essay collection, won Best Nonfiction Thesis at UNCW in 2004.

* I earned an MFA and taught Creative Nonfiction and English courses at the UNC at Wilmington.

* I'm a nonfiction editor at the online literary journal CEDARS.

* My fiction and nonfiction has appeared in: Rivendell, Third Coast, Cimarron Review,Pinyon, Whetstone, Alligator Juniper, Pedestal Magazine, the Seattle Review,Wandering Army, The Tulane Review, Blood Lotus, R.kv.r.y, Flashquake, 580 Split, YES! Magazine and 10,000 Tons of Black Ink, & Lightship Anthology 2, Huffpost, the Rumpus and The Weeklings.

* I've been anthologized in Men Speak Out (Routledge Press, UK, 2007), AmericanLives: A Reader (University of Nebraska Press, edited by Tobias Wolff, 2010), Show & Tell: Writers on Writing (University of North Carolina Wilmington in 2009) and will appear in 10,000 Tons of Black Ink "Best Of" Volume II.

Awards and Accolades:

* Twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize, once for the essay I placed with Third Coast and most recently for my short story "Ghost Train" at 10,000 Tons of Black Ink.

* The essay at Alligator Juniper won their nonfiction contest.

I've also had several honorable mentions and runner up accolades, but you know about horseshoes and hand grenades.