Astra Lincoln is "a brilliant young writer" whose work focus on people, power and place. At least one friend would beg to differ, and instead insist she's a writer of devastation. An Indian periodical that once cited her said she was a "love and crush journalist."
Astra is currently writing her first book, a researched memoir about identity formation and truth-telling in the wake of a catastrophic brain injury. In 2024, the manuscript was selected as a finalist in The Yale Review's Nonfiction Book Competition.
Winner of the Banff Mountain Book Competition’s ‘Best Mountain Article’ award in 2022, Astra was shortlisted for the award a second time in 2024. Her work has also been nominated for the Society for Environmental Journalist’s ‘Best Feature’ prize, for a National Magazine 'Best Feature' award, and for inclusion in the Best American Essays anthology. Several of her pieces have been included in ‘Best of the Year’ lists. Her work has been discussed in NPR, the New York Times, GQ, and Print Magazine, to name a few.
Currently a contributing editor at Summit Journal, Astra has previously served as the editor-in-chief of the Chrysalis literary and arts journal and as a staff writer at Capital Daily News and the Willamette Collegian.
Astra teaches and facilitates with programs like Write Around Portland and the Juneau Icefield Research program. She has led writing workshops while ski-traversing Alaska's biggest icefield, in an assisted living facility, on bike rides, to people experiencing dementia, and on the side of a mountain in the Selkirks only accessible by helicopter. She will occasionally also teach in classrooms.
A graduate of the Banff Centre’s Mountain and Wilderness Writing residency program, Astra’s work has been supported by a Freeflow Foundation scholarship and an American Alpine Club research award. In 2024, she was an Oregon Humanities Community Storytelling Fellow.
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