Laura Goode

Goode was raised in Edina, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis–Saint Paul which provided the inspiration for Sister Mischief's fictional setting of Holyhill, Minnesota.[1] From 1995 to 1998, Goode competed in Minnesota's regional and state spelling bees.[2] She graduated from Edina High School in 2002, received her B.A. in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia College, Columbia University in 2006, and received her M.F.A. in Writing from Columbia's School of the Arts in 2008.[3]

Goode's first novel for young adults, Sister Mischief, was released by Candlewick Press in 2011.[4] The book centers around a Jewish lesbian teenager named Esme who starts a hip-hop group with her friends in the fictional town of Holyhill, Minnesota. Goode was inspired to write the book because of her "love for young people, and my frustration with the lack of strong literary role models for young women of all different cultural backgrounds and sexual identities."[5] Sister Mischief was a 2012 Best of the Bay pick by the San Francisco Bay Guardian,[6] a top 10 selection of the American Library Association's Rainbow List for excellence in GLBTQ YA literature,[7] and a selection of the ALA's Amelia Bloomer List for excellence in feminist YA literature.[8]

While an undergraduate at Columbia, Goode met and became friends with Meera Menon, who starred in a play Goode wrote.[9] Later, Goode and Menon co-wrote the feature film Farah Goes Bang, which Menon directed and Goode produced.[10] Farah Goes Bang premiered at the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival,[11] where it was awarded the inaugural $25,000 Nora Ephron Prize by Tribeca and Vogue.[12] Farah Goes Bang also won the Comcast Narrative Competition at CAAMFest.[13] Goode designed and executed a Kickstarter campaign for the movie, which raised $81,160 for production of the film.[14] Farah Goes Bang's distribution was facilitated by Seed&Spark and released at retail in April 2015.[15]

Goode's essays, poems, and fiction have appeared in Bright Ideas Magazine, where she is a columnist and contributing editor, New York Magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, The Believer: Logger, Scratch, Vela, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Rumpus, BOMB, The Millions, Boston Review, The New Inquiry, IndieWire, Dossier, Fawlt, and anthologies including Starry Eyed: 16 Stories That Steal The Spotlight and Please Excuse This Poem: 100 Poets for the Next Generation.

Goode is married to Patrick Cushing, CEO of WorkHands. Their son Josiah was born in April 2014.

• Sister Mischief (young adult novel, 2011)
• Farah Goes Bang (screenplay, 2013)
• Become A Name (poetry, 2016)

• For Sister Mischief
  • Best of the Bay, San Francisco Bay Guardian 2012[6]
  • Top 10 selection of American Library Association's Rainbow List for excellence in GLBTQ YA literature 2012[7]
• For Farah Goes Bang
  • Norah Ephron Prize, Tribeca Film Festival 2013[11]
  • Comcast Narrative Competition, CAAMFest[13]
  • Bud Abbott Award for Feature Length Comedy, Garden State Film Festival 2014[16]
  • Best Narrative Feature, Austin Asian American Film Festival 2014[17]