An Interview with Raven Leilani

I first met Raven Leilani—who you’ve likely heard of by now—in graduate school at NYU, where I became a staunch admirer of the poetry and short fiction of hers I’d read online. We shared only one class together, during the second of those two years; a craft seminar. Leilani was quiet in that class, though when she did speak, her insights were revelatory. It was a special thrill to receive a galley of the novel she wrote during the program, Luster, during the early months of government-imposed lockdown. At a time when my attention span felt impossibly short, my mind clouded by the dread and monotony of 2020’s “new normal,” Leilani’s startling, meticulous prose and biting observations held me rapt (and often had me laughing out loud).