Press Coverage |

MEA Author Rod Merkley Compared to Hemingway by Time

Rod Merkley spent over ten years as a medic in the Army Reserves. During that time he was mobilized for two years to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany and deployed once to Iraq. He is currently studying clinical psychology as a 2LT in the Army Health Professions Scholarship Program and plans on serving as a psychologist in the Army after graduation. He writes short fiction and non-fiction about both his experiences in the Army and the psychological impact of war on the young men and women who fight it.

He had the following to say about working with Military Experience and the Arts:

“Working with the people who I met through the Journal of Military Experience and the Military Experience and the Arts Symposium has been awesome. I actually wrote most of my short-story “Walk Until You Sleep“ before I became involved with these wonderful individuals. They not only helped me find ways to refine my writing but they also helped me to meet the people who have given me the opportunities necessary to succeed as a writer. I truly believe that expressive writing can help us to understand the things that have happened to us in our lives and that through the veterans art movement we can all become better people.”

Rod’s story, “Walk Until You Sleep“, originally published by O-Dark-Thirty, the literary component of The Veterans Writing Project founded by Ron Capps who, coincidentally, was also an MEA 2012 instructor and lecturer, was recently published by Time Magazine. Click here to read Jeff Stein’s report about Rod and these other fine veteran authors.

Congratulations Rod! We love working with you and look forward to reading your finished contribution to the innagural issue of The Blue Falcon: A Journal of Military Fiction.

JME’s Micah Owen Featured in NYT’s “Warrior Voices”

Micah Owen’s harrowing tale of a convoy ambush in 2003 Fallujah appeared in the first Journal of Military Experience and was a recent addition to the New York Times “Warrior Voices” segment. Micah is twice a veteran of the Iraq War (2003 & 2005) and twice a contributor to the JME. Beginning his work in the first classroom of veteran authors that founded the JME, he now finds his work featured in national news outlets and is an inspiration to aspiring veteran authors.

Click on Micah’s picture below to read his story as well as those of other military authors:

Micah Owen served two tours in Iraq in the United States Army. Click on his image above to read his his JME 1 story, "Put the Truck in Gear and Drive" as part of the NYT's "Warrior Voices" segment. — Micah Owen served two tours in Iraq in the United States Army. Click on his image above to read his his JME 1 story, “Put the Truck in Gear and Drive” as part of the NYT’s “Warrior Voices” segment.

New York Times Features MEA Publications, Authors

The New York Times‘s Cecilia Capuzzi Simon recently highlighted the community-building, therapeutic outreach of Military Experience and the Arts in her article, WARRIOR VOICES: Veterans learn to write the words they could not speak.

In the article, Simon features work from several MEA authors, including Micah Owen, holding these examples up alongside other veteran authors and communities such as Veterans Writing Project’s Ronn Capps and Kate Hoit, and Army of Dude’s Alex Horton:

Mr. Owen’s story for the class — his first attempt at writing, beyond song lyrics — is a dramatic account of his convoy being ambushed in Fallujah. It was published in the first volume of Mr. Martin’s Journal of Military Experience, and it was the first time Mr. Owen’s family had heard about his military service. “I hardly ever spoke about it with them,” he says. “This was a way for my family to know what I had done.”

After reading the story, his mother cried. Mr. Owen urged his father, a Vietnam veteran, to write down the experiences he had never spoken of. At first his father balked. But in the second volume of the journal, there are two Owen essays, one by father and one by son.

he article discusses the use of writing and art as a means of healing in the wake of recent wars with a specific focus on the communities being forged out of the common purpose of creative expression…Read more.

MEA Symposium Gives Veterans ‘Creative Therapy’ by Andrew Romey

The American Legion first reported on The Journal of Military Experience just over a year ago. At that time, the JME was confined to a single veteran cohort course at Eastern Kentucky University. Now, the JME is a part of Military Experience and the Arts and contributors from throughout the country receive the same kind of one-on-one assistance that those first contributors received in their course online. American Legion Magazine’s Andy Romey covered the first JME‘s release and he’s back to discuss the second’s release as a part of the Military Experience and the Arts Symposium.

Click on the American Legion logo below to read more: