I am an associate professor of literature and creative writing at NYU Abu Dhabi. Prior to coming to NYUAD, I was an assistant professor in the department of modern English literature and culture at the University of Groningen in the north of the Netherlands. My creative work spans poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction; my research specializations include children's and YA texts, the modern and contemporary Gothic, diaspora studies, rewritings and adaptations, and literary portrayals of multilingualism and translanguaging.

I am the author of three academic books: Intersecting Diasporas (SUNY Press 2021); Uncanny Youth: Childhood, the Gothic, and the Literary Americas (University of Wales Press 2022); and They Also Write for Kids (University Press of Mississippi 2023). My writing handbook, The Imposter's Guide to Writing About Literature, is forthcoming from Rutgers University Press in February 2027. My research has been supported by grants from the Dutch Research Council, the Netherlands Initiative for Education Research, and the Children's Literature Association.

My first full-length poetry collection, Ghost Family, was published by Contraband Books. My second, Sicilianas, won the 2022 Lauria/Frasca Poetry Prize from Bordighera Press and was first finalist for the North American Poetry Book Award, judged by Lisa Russ Spaar.  The Poison Girl, my debut novel, was published by Spuyten Duyvil in the fall of 2024, and my book of lyric essays and hybrid writing, Brutal Noises, is forthcoming from Veliz Books. I am also at work on a middle-grade novel. My poems have appeared in journals including Colorado Review, New Letters, Poetry Northwest, Third Coast, and Verse Daily, and my creative nonfiction and short fiction have appeared or are forthcoming in magazines including ANMLY, Bellingham Review, DIAGRAM, failbetter, The Journal, Necessary Fiction, ROOM, and South Dakota Review. I am the managing editor of Seneca Review, where I also read poetry and CNF submissions; I read fiction for Sundog Lit and have served as a fiction reader for CRAFT and Cutbank.

Originally from rural northeastern Connecticut, I first started teaching college students at Hostos Community College in NYC in 2011. In 2015, while adjuncting at CSU San Bernardino and Occidental College, I finished my MFA in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine and my PhD in comparative literature from Yale. At the UG, I taught undergraduate and graduate courses in literature, creative writing, and professionalization, with a special focus on helping prepare students to write for publication. At NYUAD, my teaching specializations include creative nonfiction writing and children's literary studies. I have also been an ESL and literacy tutor for students ages 6-18.