Patricia A. Smith is the author of the novel The Year of Needy Girls (Kaylie Jones Books, 2017). Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Salon, Broad Street, Prime Number, Gris-Gris, The Tusculum Review, and So to Speak. Her nonfiction has appeared in the anthologies One Teacher in Ten, Tied in Knots, Something to Declare, and One Teacher in Ten in the New Millennium. She received her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University and teaches at the Appomattox Regional Governor’s School.