ARRIEL

VINSON

YA AUTHOR, POET, AND ESSAYIST


ABOUT

Photo by Reece T. Williams

Arriel Vinson is a Reese's Book Club LitUp Fellow and Midwesterner who writes about being young, Black, and in search of freedom. Her debut YA novel-in-verse, The Freedom of Falling (Putnam) is forthcoming in summer 2025. She earned her MFA in Fiction from Sarah Lawrence College. Her poetry, fiction, and essays have appeared in Kweli Journal, Catapult, The Rumpus, Waxwing, and others. A Tin House YA Scholar, 2020 Walter Grant recipient, and 2019 Kimbilio Fellow, her work has been nominated for Best New Poets 2020, Best of the Net 2019, and a Pushcart Prize. You can connect with her on Twitter and Instagram @arriwrites.

"The writing is — I’m free from pain. It’s where nobody tells me what to do; it’s where my imagination is fecund, and I am really at my best. Nothing matters more in the world or in my body or anywhere when I’m writing."

Toni Morrison


SELECTED WORKS

EVENTS

Panels

The Secrets of Successful Author Interviews, Electric Literature

Big Ideas: What Control Do We Actually Have? - A Conversation with Nicola Yoon and Danielle Evans, The Loft Literary Center (moderator)

Featured Readings

Renegade Reading Series

Soul Sister Revue

We Do Language, Apogee Journal

Honey Dipped Productions, Girlhood Reading Series

Leaf Lit Live! Poetry Reading

Great weather for media

Rooted in Blackness Poetry Reading

Writing Workshops


  • 4/27/24: Come Celebrate With Me: A Poetry Intensive (virtual), Write or Die, register here!

  • 3/26/24: How to Break Into Author Interviews (virtual), Sarah Lawrence Writing Institute, register here!

  • 2/29/24: Kristina Forest in conversation with Arriel Vinson at Loudmouth Books (Indianapolis, IN)

  • 2/9/24: Erasure Poetry Workshop with Whose Books (Dallas, TX)

  • 10/19/23: Confronting and Making Space for Heartbreak, Blue Stoop

  • 10/17/23: Writing the YA Novel-in-Verse (5-Week Workshop), Sarah Lawrence Writing Institute

  • Lead Teacher for Sarah Lawrence Writer’s Week, 2023

  • Lead Teacher for Sarah Lawrence Writer’s Week, 2022

  • Lead Teacher for Sarah Lawrence Writer’s Week, 2020

  • Writing YA Tropes, Girls Write Now

  • Erasure Poetry, Girls Write Now

  • Big Ideas Readers Seminar: Choice and Chance, The Loft Literary Center

Contact me.

Want to book me for a workshop or event, or just have a question? Please fill out the contact form!

For book-related questions, please contact my literary agent, Jodi Reamer at Writers House: jreamer@writershouse.com