Cleo Qian is a queer writer from California. She is the author of Let's Go Let's Go Let's Go, which was longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal of Excellence in Fiction and one of TIME's 100 Best Books of 2023. Her poetry manuscript-in-progress was a finalist for the 2024 National Poetry Series. Her writing has appeared in The Sun, ZYZZYVA, The Massachusetts Review, Pleiades, and several other publications.
At MacDowell, Qian worked on a novel-in-progress about a mother-daughter relationship revolving around chronic illness and codependency. She will be the Notre Dame Storyznski Writer-in-Residence in 2025. Recently, she edited the special issue “Burning Language: New and Queer Chinese Voices" for The Common magazine, which was released during her MacDowell residency.
Portrait by Casper Yen
