Author Event: Kevin Fenton in Conversation with Maureen Aiken

Kevin Fenton is the author of Merit Badges, which won the AWP Prize for the Novel, and Leaving Rollingstone, which Patricia Hampl called "the most important memoir to come out of the Midwest (or anywhere) in years." His essays on advertising design have appeared in É migrÉ and Eye (London), the anthology Looking Closer 2: Critical Writing On Graphic Design, and the UX design blog Boxes and Arrows.

Maureen Aitken’s short-story collection, The Patron Saint of Lost Girls, received a Kirkus star, the Nilsen Prize, and the Foreword Review INDIE Gold Prize for General Fiction. It will be reissued in September, 2025 by Wayne State University Press. Her stories have earned a Minnesota State Arts Board’s Artist Initiative Grant, a Loft Mentor Award, an award from Ireland’s Fish Short Story Prize, and two Pushcart Prize nominations. The book was a finalist in the Minnesota Book Awards. Her stories have been published widely in journals such as Prairie Schooner and New Letters. Most recently, she was a finalist for The Missouri Review’s Perkoff Prize.

Stylish, smart, and big-hearted, Cyan Magenta Yellow Black lovingly summons the Minneapolis Saint Paul of December of 1993, just before the internet changed everything. It’s a place where friendships form in group therapy sessions and blossom in coffee shops— and where a handful of people contemplate kerning, color palettes, and headlines with the passion of artisans. In his early thirties, Duane Einwald already has his own ad agency. And he’ s about to be married to the woman he loves. But when his idealism sharpens into something far more toxic, his fiancé e breaks off their engagement and his partners force him out. While he’ s on the adult version of a time out, he meets two new friends—Emily and Porter—who are fleeing much deeper hurts. What unfolds is a testament to the power of friendship—and to the ways seemingly small acts of kindness and connection can transform us.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

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