In a literary conference filled with recognizable and established authors, the New Voices Fellowship aims to showcase some of the country’s most exciting new talent—young, award-winning writers whose debut work is both original and daring.

This year, we look forward to welcoming New Voices Fellows Virginia Evans and Shelley Read to the 2026 Sun Valley Writers’ Conference.

Evans is the author of The New York Times bestselling debut novel The Correspondent, which was dubbed “the sleeper hit of 2025” by NPR and recently won the 2026 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel. She studied in the U.S. and Ireland and lives in North Carolina with her family.

Read is the author of the international bestselling debut novel Go as a River, translated into 30+ languages and sold worldwide. A longtime professor at Western Colorado University, she is also a mom, mountaineer, world traveler, and fifth-generation Coloradan.

Don’t miss their talks July 18-20. As presenters, they will each talk about their choice to become writers and read from their highly-acclaimed debut novels. Keep an eye on these rising stars in the years ahead.

The program was inaugurated in 2022, thanks to the support of the Grossman Family Foundation (in honor of Peggy Grossman), bringing fresh voices and perspectives into the SVWC fold.

LEARN MORE

We thank our donors and their generosity for making this special program possible. To learn more about supporting SVWC, visit our donations page.

Photo credit: Austin Joffe & Andie Tippie