Black Mountain Institute welcomes 2004 MFA graduate Dan Josefson as part of the Alumni Reading Series.

His debut novel, That’s Not a Feeling (Soho Press), about a troubled teen sent to a psychiatric boarding school, was named a New York Times Editors’ Choice and one of Booklist’s top ten first novels of 2012. David Foster Wallace pronounced him “a writer of astounding promise,” calling his novel a “bold, funny, mordant, and deeply intelligent debut.”

Readings & Panels aims to create dialogue, in opposition to monologue, as a necessary tool in the deepening of cross-cultural understanding. To that end, the program provides venues in which lively communication between people of unlike minds can occur. All visitors contribute to establishing a climate of tolerance for multiple perspectives through a cycle of colloquia, writing, and publication.