Yearnings by Stephanie Harper

Stephanie Harper is the author of Wesley Yorstead Goes Outside, winner of the 2020 Next Generation Indie Book Awards, as well as a finalist for the Colorado Book Awards and the National Indie Excellence Awards, along with others. She is also the author of the poetry collection Sermon Series. Her narrative nonfiction work can be found in a number of publications, including HelloGiggles, HuffPost, Living Lutheran, Healthline, and more. She often writes about chronic illness and spirituality. Stephanie grew up in Colorado, where she graduated from CU Boulder with a BA in English in 2009. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from Fairfield University in 2012. She’s worked on several literary magazines, including Mason’s Road and Spry Literary Journal. She also served as a guest editor for The Puritan, where she wrote and curated pieces about narrative generosity. Stephanie is also passionate about helping other writers and has served as a tutor, writing coach, and developmental editor on a number of projects. She’s always open to new projects and collaborations. Stephanie lives in Littleton, Colorado with her family. When she’s not writing, Stephanie is actively involved in a progressive faith community called Abiding Hope Church. She loves to sing and laugh and her favorite time of the day is brunch.

 

PRAISE:

 

While Harper’s collection may seem quiet and meditative at first glance, the crux of Yearnings lies in the sharp and needful undercurrent the title suggests. With tight, concise lines and grounded imagery that leads you by the hand into its dark and hungry heart, this is a book for those who feel deeply, love wholly, and see the world in signs, in poems. We have all wanted, all needed, all hoped–Harper’s universality is only strengthened by her incisive and singular storytelling. Yearnings gives all of itself, word count be damned.

–Devon Bohm, author of the poetry collection Careful Cartography 

 

Stephanie Harper‘s rhetorically deft poems are written with the emotional sincerity of a poet who has dared to love with unnerving vulnerability. At once heartbreaking and illuminating, these poems explore the blurry boundaries of the paradoxically beautiful and broken, the reserved and ravenous, and the novel and nostalgic relationships we both fear and crave. Let this deceptively small collection be the forthcoming generation’s comprehensive guide through and authenticator of modern love.

–T.E. Hahn, author of the Kirkus Star Awarded Novel Open My Eyes