10/06/2026
🎉 We’re pleased to announce our new Breakthrough Writing Residents for 2026-2027!
Residents ⤵️
• Fiction: Amira Alamin + Kadeem Thomas
• Nonfiction: Lisa Chiu + Shannon Brennen Ramdhan
• Poetry: Jen Hallaman + Raja Belle Freeman
They will spend the next year developing first book-length manuscripts with mentors Brittany Rogers, Ira Sukrungruang, and Joseph Earl Thomas.
Resident Bios ⤵️
Amira Alamin (Fiction) is a writer and playwright from Solon, Ohio. She is a Youth Playwright in Progress with Youth Playwright Theatre and holds a Master of Letters in Creative Writing with Distinction from the University of St. Andrews. Her work portrays q***r people as their dynamic and multifaceted selves.
Lisa Chiu (Nonfiction) is a Taiwanese American storyteller and food fanatic. Her work has appeared in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Ideastream Public Media, People Magazine, Ohio Magazine, and other outlets. She is working on a memoir, Hungry Ghost.
Raja Belle Freeman (Poetry) is a performance poet and visual artist. She has worked as a teaching artist for Lake Erie Ink and Twelve Literary Arts and completed a visual arts residency with Akron Soul Train. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing from CSU.
Jen Hallaman (Poetry) is a bookseller and writer living in Northeast Ohio. Her work appears in New Orleans Review, Pithead Chapel, DIAGRAM, SWING, Orange Blossom Review, and Appalachian Review, among other publications.
Shannon Brennen Ramdhan (Nonfiction) is a memoirist and fiction writer living in the Cleveland suburbs. A Pushcart Prize nominee and Literary Cleveland member, her work explores the rural Midwest, leaving and returning, estrangement and belonging, and home.
Kadeem Thomas (Fiction) is originally from Tampa, Florida, and has lived in Cleveland for nearly two years. Of Cuban, Trinidadian, and Jamaican descent, he speaks English, Spanish, and French. He holds an MBA in International Business and an MS in Supply Chain Management.
Finalists! ⤵️
• Fiction: Karim Ragab, Miranda Sepulveda, and Kei Yanamayu
• Nonfiction: River Baird, Jacqueline Owen, and Ericka Mathews
• Poetry: Noah Christopher, Lucy McNees, and Christy Rogers
Learn more at the link in the comments.
