author of Summer of the Cicadas
9:00 AM on Friday, October 21
Cole Lavalais lives in Chicago and is currently teaching as visiting writer in the W’s low-residency MFA program in creative writing. Her debut novel, Summer of the Cicadas, takes her heroine Viola Moon to a Southern HBCU, where she confronts her heritage and her struggles with mental illness. Brooklyn Magazine called it “the ultimate intersectional novel.