About
June Melby’s first book, My Family and Other Hazards (Holt, 2014), about her family’s mini golf course, was a New York Times Bestseller and won a Midwest Connections award. As a poet she has performed all over the world. Her poetry and prose have appeared or are forthcoming in Muse/A Journal; Forklift Ohio; Fugue; McSweeney’s Internet Tendency; Versal; Utne Reader; Water~Stone; LAWEEKLY; and Kaffee.Satz.Lesen v.2, out of Hamburg, Germany, among others. She received an MFA from the University of Iowa, was a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Arts (VCCA), and a recipient of the City of Hamburg International Artist Residency award.
Featured Work
My Family and Other Hazards
June Melby was forty years old and living in Los Angeles when her parents phoned to tell her the terrible news: after thirty years they were selling her childhood home back in Wisconsin. Which happened to include a miniature golf course (built circa 1959). She hated the place growing up, having to wait on half-naked tourists who wandered through the yard or whooped it up on the course, while her family worked, unable to take a vacation themselves. Or make a profit. So everyone is surprised at her reaction to the news: she freaks out.
