The following donor-funded scholarships provide Fellows with financial support to attend the Writer’s Retreat without cost. Recipients are selected from a myriad of Fellows who meet each scholarship’s respective criteria. We are grateful to all of our supporters who make this possible. 

Erica Landis Memorial Fellowship
The Erica Landis Memorial Scholarship supports a Black Fellow in any genre attending the 2022 Writer’s Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices.

The Erica Landis Memorial Scholarship Fellow is Honora Ankong. Honora is a poet, writer, and educator from Cameroon. She is a recent graduate of the MFA at Virginia tech & their debut chapbook of poems  “our gods are hungry for elegies” is out now with Glass Poetry Press. 


The Jeanne Córdova Words Scholarship
The Jeanne Córdova Words Scholarship, in memory of the beloved activist and author, is given annually. The scholarship is awarded to a lesbian-identified queer or trans woman of color working on text with lesbian content in any of the workshop categories excluding poetry. 

The 2022 Jeanne Córdova Words Scholarship Fellow is  Liana Fu. Liana is a queer nonbinary Cantonese writer and organizer from Chicago. Their creative practice playfully reimagines, critiques, and builds upon the Cantonese diasporic archive.


The Justin Chin Memorial Scholarship
Sponsored by Alexander Chee and Christine Hyung-Oak Lee, The Justin Chin Memorial Scholarship is offered annually in memory of the late author Justin Chin and supports queer, Asian American Pacific Islanders writer who write queer content in any genre. 

The 2022 Justin Chin Memorial Scholarship Fellows are Leo Aquina and Si Yon Kim.

Leo Aquino is a storyteller living in Los Angeles. They write queer romcoms, narrative nonfiction, and poetry. They are also a journalist creating financial literacy resources for queer and trans folx. 

Si Yon Kim is a writer who grew up in Ilsan and Seoul, Korea. An MFA candidate in fiction at Syracuse University, Si Yon is the noona of two doggos, Ddalgi and Ankko. 


Lili Elbe Scholarship 
Honoring the life and legacy of transgender pioneer Lili Elbe, the annual Lili Elbe Scholarship recognizes a trans Lambda Literary Fellow in any genre whose work shows considerable talent and promise. A Danish trans woman, Lili Elbe was one of the earliest recipients of gender confirmation surgery. The scholarship is sponsored by David Ebershoff, whose first novel about Elbe, The Danish Girl, won the Lambda Literary Award for transgender fiction and was adapted into an Oscar-winning film.

The 2022 Lili Elbe Scholarship Fellow is Erin Jin Mei O’Malley. Erin is an Asian adoptee writer who is based in New York. Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Muzzle, The Nashville Review, The Margins, and others. They are a big fan of cauliflower.


The Nancy Garden Scholarship
Sponsored by Sylvia and emily m. danforth, the Nancy Garden Scholarship honors the memory of author and activist Nancy Garden and annually supports a Fellow in the young adult fiction cohort. 

The 2022 Nancy Garden Scholarship Fellow is María José Maldonado. María (she/they/fairy) is a Salvadoran-Ecuadorian writer & artist born & raised in Queens, NY. Their work is queer, feminist & leftist Central American.


The Stone Soup Community Press Scholarship
Sponsored by Stone Soup Community Press, a nonprofit publisher that believes the diversity of the LGBTQ community should be reflected in the stories being published, the Stone Soup Community Press Scholarship supports a lesbian or queer-identified woman in the fiction or young adult fiction cohorts.

The 2022 Stone Soup Community Press Scholarship Fellow is Vivian DeRosa. Vivian is a writer studying English & archives at Smith College. She is a 2019 Presidential Scholar in the Arts & a 2020 Aspen Words Emerging Writer Fellow. She loves collaging & lesbian pulp fiction.


The Virtual Scholarship
The Virtual Scholarship supports a Black trans woman and/or femme who attends the 2022 Writer’s Retreat. 

The Virtual Scholarship recipient is Patricia Martin. Patricia is a writer, editor, and founder of the blog @theglamfemme. They write QTPOC-focused fiction that subverts societal norms, promoting diverse experiences and authentic voices.


Emerge Editorial Scholarship
The Lambda Literary Emerge Editorial Scholarship recognizes a Fellow who has an interest in literary editing and whose past work shows considerable promise. The 2022 Emerge Editorial Scholarship Fellow will edit this year’s Emerge anthology. The Lambda Literary Emerge Editorial Scholarship recognizes that if we want LGBTQIA+ writers to feel at home in the literary landscape and for publishing to be full of our many perspectives, we must provide LGBTQIA+ writers the opportunity to learn about and take part in the editorial process. 

The 2022 winner of the Lambda Literary Emerge Editorial Scholarship is Shelby Pinkham. Shelby is a Chicanx, queer, bipolar poet. Their writing has been published in Pank, Honey Literary, and elsewhere. They earned an MFA from Fresno State.


Additional Scholarships
Lambda Literary received donations from many generous donors to cover the full tuition of twelve 2022 Fellows. The Fellows supported by these donations are: aureleo sans, Bobuq Sayed, Daniel Garcia, E Infante, Gulet Isse, Irene Villaseñor, Juniper Johnson, Lara Ameen, Luz Rosales, Malik Thompson, Michal Jones, and Peggy Lee.

aureleo sans is a Colombian-American, non-binary, queer, formerly unhoused writer with a disability who resides in San Antonio, Texas. This year, she is a Tin House Scholar, a Roots Wounds Words Writers Retreat fellow, a Lambda Literary fellow, an ASF Workshop Fellow, and a Periplus fellow.

Bobuq Sayed is a queer Afghan writer with an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Miami, where they were a James A. Michener Fellow, and winner of the Dean’s Award and the Irene Pines Award.

@daniellovesyooh’s [Daniel Garcia’s] work appears/is forthcoming in Guernica, Ploughshares, Kenyon Review, Gulf Coast, & more. An editor for @splitlipthemag & @GASHERjournal, Daniel’s essays appear as Notables in The Best American Essays.

Emilio Trejo Infante is a Los Angeles based playwright whose work centers around issues of climate change and environmental racism, as well as the queer Chicano experience.

Gulet Isse (They/Them) is a Somali American writer, actor, and art curator based in South LA. Since graduating from USC last year (with a double major in Theater and Narrative Studies), Gulet has worked on various films, music videos, and TV series that are set to air later this year. Their work explores themes of complex [chosen/blood] family dynamics, queer love, grief, and conflicting definitions of ‘home’ as a nomad with roots around the world.

Irene Villaseñor’s writing appears in Queer Nature: An Ecoqueer Poetry Anthology, My Phone Lies to Me: Fake News Poetry Workshops as Radical Digital Media Literacy, Nepantla: An Anthology Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color, Nat. Brut, The Yellow Medicine Review: A Journal of Indigenous Literature, Art, and Thought, and elsewhere.

Juniper Johnson is a screenwriter, fine art photographer, and an avid wearer of the color green. Born in California and raised in Florida, she uses her bicoastal perspective to explore blackness in all of its beautiful, complicated glory.

Lara Ameen writes one-hour genre drama pilots and speculative fiction centering queer, disabled characters with fantastical twists.

Luz Rosales is a Mexican-American college student and horror lover from South LA. They have been published in Strange Horizons, Black Telephone Magazine, Cotton Xenomorph, and elsewhere.

Malik Thompson is a Black queer man from Washington, DC.

Michal ‘MJ’ Jones is a poet & parent, and the Editor-In-Chief of Foglifter Press. They have a debut full-length poetry collection HOOD VACATIONS from Black Lawrence Press, and a chapbook, SOFT ARMOR, from Nomadic Press, both forthcoming in 2023.

Peggy Kyoungwon Lee is a queer, femme writer and professor based in DC. Her novel is inspired by anticolonial Korean anarchist resistance. Rihanna circa 2012 and Rosa Luxemburg are her forever vibes. Learn more at peggyleewrites.com.


In addition to scholarships provided by the generosity of the donors listed above, thanks to Lambda Literary’s supporters, we were able to provide 9 partial scholarships to the following Fellows: A.C. Lamberty, Andy Winter, Aqueela Culbreath-Britt, Bex Ehrmann, Caoimhe Harlock, Cindy Juyoung Ok, Poonam Dhir, sheena daree miller, and Tobias Tegrotenhuis.

A.C. Lamberty is a filmmaker with a distinctly Midwestern, distinctly trans sensibility. With honors from NewFest, QueerWrites, Hollyshorts and Shore Scripts, their work focuses on sex, desire and power.

Andy Winter is a non-binary trans-femme ice goddess living in the warm tropics of Singapore.

Aqueela C. Britt writes raw, matter-of-fact stories about LGBTQIA black and brown kids trying to live their best lives. She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from Lesley University and has a diverse collection of works in progress.

Bex Ehrmann (@BexEhrmann) is a Chicago-based writer, theatremaker, and educator. They are an MFA candidate at Hamline University, where they study Writing for Children and Young Adults.

Caoimhe Harlock (she/her) is a southern trans writer. Her work appears in Evergreen Review, Tribes, Honey Lit, and others.

Cindy Juyoung Ok teaches creative writing and has published in The Yale Review, Poetry, The Margins, Cincinnati Review, and Colorado Review.

Poonam Dhir (@pnmdhir) is a queer playwright, poet, Punjabi descendent and settler. They were a finalist for the 2021 PEN Canada New Voices Award in poetry. You can read her latest pieces in Vallum, Contemporary Verse 2 and PRISM International.

sheena d. miller [bookofsheena.com] is an essayist and failed stand-up comedian originally from Ohio. sheena, is currently at work on an essay collection that grapples with blackness, queerness, and home, while asking what it means to belong to, reflect, and carry a place.

Toby Tegrotenhuis is a Filipino American poet from Colorado. Prior to Lambda, they were an associate editor for @coppernickel and copyedited for @cu_sentry.

To learn more about the Fellows, visit our website. 


With care,

Chloe Feffer (she/they)
Program Manager
Lambda Literary