Born and raised in the Hill Country of central Texas, Warren Stoddard II attended Texas State University and received a BA in English. Following his graduation in 2018, he traveled to Syria to fight as a member of the Kurdish YPG in the war against the Islamic State. He was later wounded in action liberating the city of Ash Sha'fah from ISIS control. After three years in the US, he participated in the international response to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine and the defense of the city of Mykolaiv.
An avid vintage motorcycle and car enthusiast, he has worked as a staff writer for Hotcars and Vehicle History. Stoddard is the author of the novella No Birds in Yesterday and the short story collection A Good Place on the Banks of the Euphrates. His work has been featured in numerous literary publications around the globe; Stoddard's short story "The Way of the World" was the winner of the 2018 Gates-Thomas Prize for Fiction, and "When This Plane Lands" was listed as Notable Literary Nonfiction in Best American Essays: 2021.
Send questions, comments and corrections to info@creativewritingmfa.info.
Disclaimer: No endorsement of these ratings should be implied by the writers and writing programs listed on this site, or by the editors and publishers of Best American Short Stories, Best American Essays, Best American Poetry, The O. Henry Prize Stories and The Pushcart Prize Anthology.