
Cara Blue Adams, MFA
Associate Professor and Director of Poetry-in-the-Round
Department of English
(973) 761-5151
Email
Fahy Hall
Room 374
Cara Blue Adams, MFA
Associate Professor and Director of Poetry-in-the-Round
Department of English
Cara Blue Adams is the author of the interlinked story collection You Never Get It Back (University of Iowa Press, 2021), which was awarded the John Simmons Short Fiction Prize, judged by Brandon Taylor, who calls it "a modern classic." It was named a New York Times Editors’ Choice, shortlisted for the Mary McCarthy Prize, and longlisted for the Story Prize. Over twenty-five of her stories appear in literary magazines, including Granta, The Kenyon Review, and Narrative. Her stories have been awarded the Kenyon Review Short Fiction Prize, the Missouri Review Peden Prize, and the Meringoff Prize, along with twice being named Pushcart Prize Notables. Cara is also the recipient of a 2018 Center for Fiction Emerging Writer Fellowship, together with support from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, the New York State Council on the Arts, and elsewhere. Her nonfiction appears or is forthcoming in The New Yorker, Bookforum, The Believer, and The Little Magazine in Contemporary America (University of Chicago Press, 2015). Before joining the faculty at Seton Hall, she served as co-editor of The Southern Review.
Education
- M.F.A., University of Arizona
- B.A., Smith College
Scholarship
Anthologized Stories and Essays
- "Charity." The Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellows: An Anthology. The Center for Fiction, 2018.
- “Decent Company Between the Covers.” The Little Magazine in Contemporary America. Ed. Ian Morris and Joanne Diaz. University of Chicago Press, 2015.
Stories
- "At the Gates." The Mississippi Review. Forthcoming.
- "You Never Get It Back." Alaska Quarterly Review. Forthcoming.
- "Never Gotten, Never Had." Epoch. Forthcoming.
- "Desert Light." Literary Matters. Forthcoming.
- "The Coast of New Hampshire." Copper Nickel 31 (Fall 2020): 83-86.
- "The Birdcage." Story 8 (Summer 2020): 48-62.
- "The Foothills of Tucson." American Short Fiction 22:69 (Summer 2019): 57-74.
- "The Most Common State of Matter." Granta (28 Feb. 2019).
- "Paper." Gulf Coast 30:2 (Summer/Fall 2019): 53-54.
- "Above the Ground." West Branch 87 (Spring/Summer 2018).
- "Palacio de los Pollos." Epoch 67:2 (Spring 2018): 163-168.
- "Said Yes." Kenyon Review Online (January/February 2017).
Essays and Literary Interviews
- "Experimental Fiction Panel at the End of the World." The Believer. (27 Mar. 2020).
- "On Technology and Fiction: Solitude and the Constructed Self." Boulevard (October 2016): 144-147.
- "An Interview with Jason Ockert." StorySouth (Spring 2016). With co-interviewer
Daniel Cross Turner.
Accomplishments
Grants, Fellowships, and Visiting Appointments
- The Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellow, The Center for Fiction, Brooklyn, New York, 2018-19.
- New York-Quebec Artist Exchange Grant funded by the New York State Council on the Arts, Summer 2017.
- Visiting Scholar, Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Society and Culture, Concordia University, Montréal, Canada, Summer 2017.
Other Awards and Honors
- Meringoff Fiction Prize, awarded for "Desert Light," 2020.
- Sarabande Books Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction finalist, 2020.
- The Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison fellowship finalist, 2020.
- Seton Hall University Research Council Grant, 2020.
- Pushcart Prize nominee, 2019.
- The Lewinson Center for the Study of Labor, Inequality, and Social Justice faculty fellow, 2019.
- Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts fiction residency, 2018.
- Pushcart Prize nominee, 2018.
- Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts fiction residency, 2017. (declined)
- Can Serrat fiction residency, 2017. (declined)
- Olive B. O’Connor Fellowship in Creative Writing at Colgate University finalist, 2016.
- Disquiet International Literary Prize semifinalist, 2016.
Invited Readings
- H.I.P. Lit, Elsewhere, Brooklyn, NY, 2019.
- An Evening with the 2018 NYC Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellows, The Center for Fiction, Brooklyn, NY, 2019.
- Local Knowledge Reading Series, Manhattan, NY, 2019.
- An Evening with the 2018 NYC Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellows, MacDowell Colony Event Space, Manhattan, NY, 2018.
- Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Society and Culture, Concordia University, Montréal, Québec, Canada, 2017.
- Hybrid Heaven, Montréal, Québec, Canada, 2017.
- Resonance Reading Series, Montréal, Québec, Canada, 2017.
- Lafayette College, Department of English, Easton, PA, 2016.
- Cuttyhunk Island Writers’ Residency Reading, Cuttyhunk, MA, 2016.
- Poetry-in-the-Round, Seton Hall University, South Orange, MA, 2015.
Media
- Contributor to Before and After the Book Deal by Courtney Maum (Catapult, 2020).
- "The Aha! Moment: Cara Blue Adams of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference" by Michael Bourne, Poets & Writers, March/April 2016.
- "Residents of Fishers Island Seek Artists for Neighbors" by Emily J. Weitz, New York Times, October 29, 2015.
- "Things American: Writers Remember James Salter." American Short Fiction online, July 22, 2015.
- "Practical Art: On Teaching the Business of Creative Writing" by Nick Ripatrazone, The Millions, August 20, 2014.