My Country Tis of Me: Two Memoirs

This event is part of the PEN America “Borders and Belonging” Sessions at the 2019 Southern Festival of Books. Free and open to the public, the annual Southern Festival of Books offers readers and writers an opportunity to celebrate the joy of reading and lifelong learning. To learn more, click here.

Kendra Allen was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, and is currently an MFA candidate at the University of Alabama. Her work has been published in Brevity, December Magazine, and the Rumpus.

Jennine Capó Crucet is the author of two previous books and is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times. Her novel, Make Your Home Among Strangers, was a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice book, the winner of the 2016 International Latino Book Award, and was cited as the best book of the year by NBC Latino, the Guardian, and the Miami Herald; it has been adopted as an all-campus read at over 25 American universities. Her short stories have been honored with the Iowa Short Fiction Award, an O. Henry Prize, and other awards. Raised in Miami, Florida, she is an associate professor in the Department of English and the Institute for Ethnic Studies at the University of Nebraska.