MFA Writers

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The podcast where we talk to MFA students about their program, their process, and a piece they're working on. Hosted by Jared McCormack.

10/06/2026

NEW EPISODE: Florida is more than a setting in Taylor Melia Elyse Mahone’s fiction. It’s wild, prehistoric, and supernatural. It’s a place where alligators are dinosaurs in the night, and the universe might just be carried on the back of one. Taylor draws on the landscape, mythology, and Gothic strangeness of her home state to build stories.

In this episode, Jared and Taylor talk about the intimate writing community she found in the McNeese State MFA, finding structure and accountability after graduation, the magic of visiting writer conferences, and her return to academia as a PhD student at Florida State University. Plus, Taylor shares why she believes MFA students should take every opportunity they can, get close to their cohort, and remember that, for this brief period of their lives, they’re there to write.

Taylor is a fiction writer from Central Florida and holds an MFA and an MA from McNeese State University. She writes about the sublime, the supernatural, Floridian landscapes, astrology, relationships, and reptiles. Fiction from her short story collection has appeared in Salamander Magazine, The Collidescope, Eckleburg Review, Eunoia Review, and Chrome Baby by Deep Sett Press. Her story, “Summerland”, which you can read in Salamander, was recently chosen as a winner of the 2026 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. Taylor is currently pursuing a PhD in Literature at Florida State University.

09/22/2026

In this episode, Jared and Shipra Agarwal talk about writing desire, shame, and female sexuality within collectivist cultures, and how those themes shape Shipra’s writing. They discuss the complicated responsibility of writing about India for a Western audience and the pressure to represent an entire culture. Shipra shares why she believes the answer is not to shy away from writing about home, but to add more stories and more voices to the literary landscape.

They also talk about Shipra’s unexpected path to becoming a writer, from training as a doctor to earning an MBA, working as a brand manager for McDonald’s India, and eventually beginning an MFA at 40. She shares her experience in the writing community at Arizona State University and how it has shaped her as a writer.

Shipra is a doctor-turned-brand-manager-turned-writer from India, pursuing an MFA in fiction at Arizona State University. Her work has been published in Witness Magazine and The Rumpus, awarded first place in the Glendon and Kathryn Swarthout Awards in 2026 and second place in 2025, nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Prize and the Pushcart Prize, shortlisted for the First Pages Prize and the Iron Horse Long Story Prize, and supported by a Tin House Summer Workshop scholarship, the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, a residency at the Sundress Academy for the Arts, an Anaphora Arts scholarship, and a fellowship at the Authentic Voices Program. Shipra is the Editor-in-Chief of Best of the Net, and she’s currently working on a novel and an essay collection.

09/03/2026

Moments from our latest episode with katie bb

08/25/2026

NEW EPISODE: Should location be an important factor when choosing an MFA program? In our newest episode, Jared and katie wills evans talk about choosing an MFA program not only for the writing, but for the place where you’ll be living and creating. They discuss what makes New Orleans such a remarkable home for writers and artists, and how the city’s distinct history, culture, music, and traditions find their way into the creative life.

katie wills evans is a second-year MFA candidate in fiction at the University of New Orleans who considers herself a poet and teacher above all else, having spent the last fourteen years working with teenagers in New Orleans public schools. Their short story “Something for the Children” was a finalist in Writer’s Digest’s 2024 Short Short Story contest, their poem “meth addicted fish” was a finalist in the Connecticut Poetry Society’s Experimental Poetry Contest, and they have essays and interviews published in The Progressive, EdSurge, and Variable West Magazine.

08/18/2026

Moments from our latest episode of MFA Writers with Jemimah James Wei / 魏信子.

08/11/2026

SEASON 7 PREMIERE: We are thrilled to start season 7 Jemimah Wei, who talks about her debut novel, The Original Daughter, and how growing up in Singapore shaped the way she thinks about storytelling, identity, and our relationship with technology. She and Jared also explore what Singapore can teach us about the rapidly changing world of AI, the ways technology is training us to move faster than we were meant to, and how reading and writing can alter our experience of time. Their conversation asks what it means to resist the pressure to rush, why speed should never be the goal for its own sake, and how stories can help us hold onto what makes us human.

Jemimah was born and raised in Singapore and splits her time between Singapore and the United States. She is a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, winner of the William Van D**e Short Story Prize, and formerly held the Wallace Stegner Fellowship and Felipe P. De Alba Fellowship at Stanford University and Columbia University respectively. Her highly anticipated debut novel, The Original Daughter, debuted at #1 on The Straits Times bestseller list, is a Good Morning America Book Club pick, and a New York Times Editors’ Choice. The Original Daughter won the Country Award for the Chōmmanard International Women’s Literary Award, was longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, and was named a Best Book of Spring by TIME, Foreign Policy, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Vogue, and more.

06/09/2026

Moments from our latest episode with

06/02/2026

NEW EPISODE: What does it mean to honor the reader? In this episode, Rey M. Rodríguez joins Jared to discuss why writing is, at its heart, a sacred act. They explore the profound influence Rey’s mother had on his creative life, his journey as a writer, and how the Institute of American Indian Arts helped him deepen his understanding of storytelling, identity, and justice. Along the way, Rey reflects on the recent release of his poetry collection, Todos Somos Sagrados / All Are Sacred, and shares how poetry has taught him to weigh every word with care, collapse time on the page, and approach readers with humility and respect.

Rey M. Rodríguez is a writer, advocate, and attorney. He lives in Pasadena, California. He is working on a novel set in Mexico City and his book of poetry, Todos Somos Sagrados - All Are Sacred just came out with El Ma****lo Press. He has attended the Yale Writers’ Workshop multiple times and Palabras de Pueblo workshop once. He participated in Story Studio’s Novel in a Year Program. He is a second-year fiction writing MFA student at the Institute of American Indian Arts. His poetry is published in Huizache. His other interviews and book reviews can be found at La Bloga, Chapter House’s Storyteller’s Corner, Full Stop, Pleiades Magazine, and the Los Angeles Review. He is a graduate of Cornell, Princeton, and U.C. Berkeley Law School.

MFA Writers is hosted by Jared McCormack and produced by Jared McCormack, Hanamori Skoblow, and Brié Goumaz. New episodes are released every two weeks. You can find more MFA Writers at MFAwriters.com.

Photo Credit: Vivian Saint Rain

05/19/2026

Episode Rerelease: Integrating elegy, ekphrasis, and dance notation, Oli Peters’s thesis project is a multilingual, multi-genre exploration in translation and lyric poetry. In this episode, she shares how her program encourages creative experimentation, even when she submits work that feels “absolutely unpublishable, verging on unreadable.” Plus, she discusses her courses in Medieval manuscripts and theater, university-funded opportunities in Paris and Ireland, and how being rejected from MFA programs right after undergrad led her to spend five years writing daily for no one but herself.

Oli is a second-year MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Notre Dame. Her writing is forthcoming in Annulet, DIAGRAM, DREGINALD, and mercury firs. Her past work appears in Pleiades, New World Writing, Rain Taxi, Heavy Feather Review, and abobo zine. Her dance-performance piece “Body Glyph State” will be performed at the 2025 Iowa Choreography Festival. She is a MFA candidate at the University of Notre Dame. Find her at her website, oliupeters.wixsite.com/olipeters, and on Instagram .

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