Photo credit: Cat Gwynn
Meet our 2025 Creative Nonfiction judge, Deanne Stillman.
Deanne Stillman is a widely published, critically acclaimed writer and playwright. She’s also a founder of the UC Riverside-Palm Desert Low Residency MFA Creative Writing Program, where she taught for thirteen years. She has guided many along the writing trail, and among others, was Congressman Mark Takano’s thesis advisor.
Her books of literary nonfiction are place-based stories of war and peace in the modern and historical West. They include:
Blood Brothers. It’s about the strange friendship between Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill, and also features Annie Oakley. It’s framed by the Little Bighorn and Wounded Knee, and explores the spectacle of the Wild West show while Sitting Bull traveled with Cody and Oakley for four months in 1885. Part of it takes place at Standing Rock, where Sitting Bull lived and was assassinated. It received the Ohioana Award for nonfiction, was excerpted in Newsweek, received a starred review from Kirkus, was named a “best new history book” by Barnes and Noble, appeared on two “best of the year” lists at The Millions, and was praised by Doug Brinkley, Ron Rosenbaum, Thomas Powers, and others. Now under option.
Twentynine Palms. It was an LA Times bestseller and “best book of the year.” Hunter Thompson called it “A strange and brilliant story by an important American writer,” and the latest edition has a foreword by T. Jefferson Parker and a preface by Charles Bowden. The conclusion of a ten-year journey, the book explores the world of rootless kids who live next to Joshua Tree National Park via the prism of the murders of two young girls by a Marine shortly after the Gulf War. Among other things, Deanne traces the family legacy of each victim back for generations, in one case to the Donner Party and the other to a shack in the Phillipines. “The world is finally catching up with Stillman,” Andy Lewis recently wrote in the Optionist.
Desert Reckoning. It’s based on her Rolling Stone piece, ”The Great Mojave Manhunt,” a finalist for a PEN Center USA journalism award; the book was a winner of the Spur Award, LA Press Club Award, and named a Southwest Book of the Year. It was also an amazon editors pick and received excellent reviews in many publications, including Newsweek, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Kirkus, Tucson Weekly, and Oregonian. It’s about the fatal collision between a hermit and a cop in the desert north of LA, telling a story of fathers and sons, ancient myth, Joshua trees, law enforcement in LA county from frontier days through the modern era. Now under option. “Deanne Stillman is the Raymond Chandler of the New West.” – Gustavo Arellano
Mustang, a history of the wild horse in the West, with an account of the ongoing wars against it. Ten years in the making, it asks why are we, a cowboy nation, destroying the horse we rode in on? Mustang was an LA Times “best book of the year,” won the California Book Award silver medal for nonfiction, and was praised in the Atlantic Monthly, PW, Economist, NPR’s On Point, Orion, Seattle Times, Santa Fe New Mexican, Cleveland Plain-Dealer, Kirkus, and numerous other publications. It has brought many into the campaign for wild horse and burro preservation and has led to the rescue of many horses headed to the slaughterhouse. In audio with Frances Fisher, Anjelica Huston, Wendie Malick, and other all-stars. “Remarkable.” – Tony Hillerman
American Confidential, about Lee Harvey Oswald and his mother and how together, they formed an inadvertent conspiracy of one, locked in a desperate pursuit of fame. It also suggests that Lee Harvey Oswald was the first Travis Bickle, and portrays him as a precursor of the young men and boys who are today’s mass shooters, taking selifes with their weapons and seeking recognition. Praised by Jerry Stahl, Darren Straus, Gustavo Arellano, and others, American Confidential was excerpted in Crime Reads and described by Air Mail for its “dazzling and evocative prose.”
In addition, Deanne’s work appears in many publications, including the Washington Monthly, UK Independent, Los Angeles Review of Books (“Letter from the West” column); New York Times (Magazine, Book Review, Arts & Leisure, Travel); High Country News; The Los Angeles Times; Boston Globe; Orion; Slate; Salon; Tin House, and elsewhere. Her work is widely anthologized, and her plays have been produced and won prizes in festivals around the country, including “Reflections in a D’Back’s Eye,” a 2024 semi-finalist in the Echo Theater New Play Competition in LA. It’s based on her prose poem of the same title, published at Gwarlingo.
Learn more about Deanne and her work at DeanneStillman.com , and connect with her on Instagram at @RealDeanneStillman and on Bluesky at @deanne5.bsky.social.