Michal Ketner


After getting laid off in 2001, Michal Ketner moved from Leland, N.C., to Richmond, likening her journey to that of an immigrant seeking a better life. Currently doing administrative work through a temp agency, Ketner, 34, has always harbored a love of writing. “Visiting Day” is the first story she's written in eight years. Based on the recent death of her father, Lexie Burton, and the experiences of her mother-in-law, Anne “Nancy” Ketner, in a rehabilitation center after surgery, she has a feeling of affinity for people in situations like Joshua's. She dedicates her story to her father and mother-in-law. Judge Catherine Baab writes: “The author moves easily between past and present, giving the reader a sense of these characters' lives beyond the few moments portrayed in the story. The writing's poetic without being ostentatious, as in the phrase, ‘She swirled up a rich foam in a soap cup.’”

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