Author: Belinda Clarke

Ten writers have been accepted into this year’s George R.R. Martin Summer Intensive Writing Workshop.

Medill received hundreds of applications from accomplished journalists around the world. The 2026 group of Fellows includes veteran journalists covering a variety of topics such as culture, fashion, finance, foreign policy, immigration, public health and sports. They hail from Canada, Ireland and the United States, and media outlets including the New York Times, NBC, ESPN and the Irish Times.

“We are thrilled to have such gifted journalists and storytellers in our third workshop,” said Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan, George R.R. Martin Chair in Storytelling and senior lecturer. “The projects our 2026 Fellows have been working on are vital stories of our time. We look forward to helping them hone and introduce these novels to the literary world.”

Over the course of the seven-day workshop, Fellows will attend craft-focused classes taught by award-winning novelists, attend firesides with visiting authors, have the opportunity to meet literary agents and have concentrated writing time. Twenty-two journalists attended this workshop in its first two years, and some have recently completed first drafts of their novels.

“This workshop would not be happening without the vision and generosity of George R.R. Martin,” Tan said. “We are enormously grateful.”

This year’s participants are:

Dotun Akintoye
Staff Writer at ESPN The Magazine

Akintoye is a writer and former editor at ESPN. His work has appeared in print, digital, audio and television, and his writing has been anthologized in The Best American Magazine Writing and recognized by the National Association of Black Journalists and the Associated Press Sports Editors. A former Nieman Fellow, he was a finalist for the 2022 National Magazine Award in profile writing.

Catherine Baab
Staff Reporter at Quartz

Baab is a senior reporter at Quartz who covers markets through breaking news and long-form features, with a focus on explaining complex financial matters to help readers better understand stocks and the economy. Her recent work includes stories on AI regulation and First Amendment law, as well as on how the Trump administration’s changes to the tax code have reshaped tech employment. She writes a dedicated weekly newsletter, “Quartz Markets,” along with Quartz’s popular monthly culture newsletter, “Obsessions.” She’s previously contributed to the Wall Street Journal, Slate, CNBC, NBC News, Literary Hub, Electric Literature and many others.

Stella Bugbee
Editor, Styles at The New York Times

Bugbee has been the Styles editor of The New York Times since 2021. She was previously an editor at large at New York magazine and the president and editor-in-chief of The Cut. She came to journalism first through design and creative direction, with stints at Condé Nast and Ogilvy. At The Cut, she took that experience and reimagined a digital vertical beyond fashion, transforming it into a site about modern womanhood. It became a place where readers didn’t just look for what to wear, but how to make sense of the world. During the #MeToo era, The Cut published some of the most widely read, intimate and seismic journalism on the subject. Since arriving at The New York Times, she has applied that same capacious sensibility to Styles, sharpening its point of view and expanding its reach.

Cora Currier
Freelance Writer and Editor, Lux Magazine

Currier is a writer and editor with work in The New Republic, The New York Review of Books, The Nation, ProPublica and many other outlets. Her reporting has long focused on the war on terror and U.S. foreign policy, which is also the subject of her novel-in-progress. Cora was a producer for “Serial Season Four: Guantánamo” and a reporter and editor at The Intercept, where she covered human rights, surveillance, immigration and other topics, and broke stories from the Snowden leaks. Most recently, she has been a contributing literary editor for The New Republic and is an editor at the feminist magazine Lux.

Monée Fields-White (MSJ95)
Managing Editor, Los Angeles Business Journal

As an award-winning journalist and proud Medill graduate, Fields-White’s path to fiction has crossed over several news media. That includes newswires, television news, magazines and documentaries. Her work has appeared in Bloomberg News, Bloomberg Markets Magazine, The Root, Crain’s Chicago Business, Fast Company and American Banker Magazine. She also co- produced the Discovery+ documentary series “Uprooted” (2022) and the Vox Media Studios/Netflix series “Files of the Unexplained” (2024). Currently, she serves as the managing editor of the Los Angeles Business Journal.

Aaron Fox-Lerner
Freelance Writer and Editor

Fox-Lerner is a Brooklyn-based writer of both nonfiction and fiction. He spent years living in Beijing, where he covered everything from banned film festivals to North Korean tourism. He’s written for outlets including Time Out, IndieWire, Eater, The Awl, Delayed Gratification and the Los Angeles Review of Books. He has also served as an editor for multiple independent publications, including Chaoyang Trap, a newsletter about Chinese internet culture, and Open Sesame, a print-only magazine about Taobao, China’s largest online marketplace.

Michael Marrero
Photojournalist and Visual Journalist

Marrero is a Cuban-American writer and visual journalist based in Key West, Florida. His short story “Saint Lazarus” will appear in Key West Noir (Akashic Press, 2027), and he is currently drafting “LOCURA,” a literary crime novel set in 1975 Key West. His work explores the Cuban diaspora, island mythology and cultural memory. As a credentialed photojournalist, his work has been distributed nationally through the Associated Press and Reuters via the Florida Keys News Bureau. His photography series “Orisha: The Lost Saints” received a Knight Foundation Grant and was exhibited at the Havana Biennial. His play “LOCURA” was produced in Havana, New York and Key West as part of a U.S.-Cuba theatrical exchange. His films have screened at over 100 international festivals, including Fantastic Fest and Fantasia. He currently serves as Executive Director of Williams Hall and is a permanent resident artist at The Studios of Key West.

Una Mullally
Columnist and Feature Writer at The Irish Times

Mullally is a writer from Dublin, Ireland. Her journalism and essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Granta, The Stinging Fly, Foreign Policy and The Irish Times, where she writes a weekly column on society, culture, and politics. She is drawn to stories and themes concerning emerging social, political, and cultural upheaval and change, and their consequences. She has covered the Irish abortion rights and marriage equality movements, the Irish far-right movement, the Irish language revival, the data centre industry and the dynamics of post-pandemic cities. She is the founder of the independent queer press, Sliver, and its zine imprint 4Ls Press. She is the author of two books on social change in Ireland, “In the Name of Love” (2014) and “Repeal the 8th” (2018).

Ashley Okwuosa
Staff Reporter at The Examination

Okwuosa is a Toronto-based journalist covering the food industry for The Examination, an investigative newsroom focused on global public health. Previously, she has reported on immigration, education, politics and related issues, and her work has been published by outlets including The Boston Globe, The Christian Science Monitor, WNYC, Quartz, TVO.org, and The Narwhal.

Laura Wides-Muñoz
Director of Standards at NBC News

Laura Wides-Muñoz is a director of editorial standards for NBC News Group, vetting coverage from conflicts in the Middle East to U.S. Immigration policy and the latest crypto legal battles. Previously, she oversaw standards for ABC News’ Washington bureau and the Miami-based millennial Fusion Network, where she also helped lead the investigative team and served as vice president for special projects. In addition to her experience in network news, Laura served as deputy bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times in Washington, D.C., and covered Hispanic Affairs and U.S.-Cuba relations for more than a decade at The Associated Press. Her book, “The Making of a Dream,” about the nation’s immigrant youth movement, was a semifinalist for the 2018 PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith nonfiction award. Laura began her career in journalism covering the end of the Guatemalan civil war. The experience inspired her to write her first (and so far only) novel. She is a D.C. native who now lives just outside the city with her husband, two teens and fist-bumping pup Lucky.