Sarah Braunstein

Iowa Writers' Workshop alumna Sarah Braunstein (M.F.A. in Creative Writing '00) has received the 2007 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award, an award given annually to six women writers who demonstrate excellence and promise in the early stages of their careers.

"Sarah's work, beautiful and singular, has haunted me for years," her nominator wrote. "She creates worlds and characters that are so vivid, strange, and richly imagined, you emerge from her work feeling changed. She possesses both uncanny insight into human behavior and the language to capture it freshly and memorably on the page."

Sarah Braunstein has an M.F.A. from The University of Iowa and she recently completed her M.S.W. from Smith College. The Jaffe Awards, which have been increased this year to $25,000, were presented to the six recipients this autumn in New York City.

Article >> Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Awards

Sarah Braunstein, 30, of Portland, Maine, is working on a first novel, "Split", that follows several interconnected characters in the process of fleeing their small-town lives. She has been working part-time as a social worker. She plans to use her Writer's Award for child care and studio space as well as taking a research trip to New York State, where most of her novel is set.