About

New Limestone Review is the literary journal of the University of Kentucky’s MFA in Creative Writing program.

Established in 1986, New Limestone Review (originally Limestone) published work from internationally-recognized poets Seamus Heaney and Paul Muldoon and from many noted Kentucky writers, including Wendell Berry, Gurney Norman, Ed McClanahan, Frank X Walker, Maurice Manning, Nikky Finney, and Holly Goddard Jones.

New Limestone Review seeks to bring groundbreaking works of literary art to the web and to a national audience.


Editorial Staff

Poetry Editor: Kate Arden

Kate Arden is an MFA candidate at the University of Kentucky. She received a BA in English and Political Science from the University of North Carolina. Her work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Cordite Poetry Review, Passages North, Ghost City Review, and Hole in the Head Review. She was a finalist for the 2023 Elinor Benedict Poetry Prize.


Nonfiction Editor + Editor-in-Chief: Akhira Mahal
Akhira Mahal is a Black and Filipina Muslim American from Kentucky. She received her B.A. in journalism and English from the University of Kentucky in 2017 and is currently a second-year in UK’s MFA Creative Writing program. She is a recovering journalist, a passionate editor, an occasional poet, and a binge fiction writer. She has several years of writing and editing experience in journalistic, academic, and creative settings.

Fiction Editor: Nick Ruma

Assistant Editors: Mallory Donoghue, Katie Limberg, Jaydon Pritchard, Emily Warren, and Meg Whelan

Faculty Advisor: Andrew Milward
Andrew Milward was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and grew up in Lawrence, Kansas. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he is the author of the story collections The Agriculture Hall of Fame, which was awarded the Juniper Prize for Fiction by the University of Massachusetts, and I Was a Revolutionary (HarperCollins, 2015), which was awarded the Friends of American Writers Literature Award. His fiction has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award and appeared in many places, including ZoetropeAmerican Short FictionVQRThe Southern ReviewGuernica, as well as Best New American Voices. His first book of nonfiction, Jayhawker: On History, Home, and Basketball was released Fall 2019. Milward has served as the McCreight Fiction Fellow at the University of Wisconsin, a Steinbeck Fellow at San Jose State University, and has received fellowships and awards from the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Corporation of Yaddo.


Former Editors

August 2022 – May 2023

Editor: Henry Knollenberg
Editor: Clay Shields
Editor: Daniel Collins
Faculty Advisor: Frank X Walker


February 2021 – May 2022

Editor: Allegra Solomon
Editor: Peyton Howard
Editor: Kevin Bond


February 2020 – May 2021

Editor-in-Chief: Gavin Colton
Editor-in-Chief: Emily M. Goldsmith
Fiction Editor: Chan Kelly
Poetry Editor: Gabby Oliver


March 2019 – February 2020

Editor-in-Chief: Zeke Perkins
Managing Editor: Kimberly Glanzman
Fiction Editor: Michael McEwen
Poetry Editor: Dane Ritter
Podcast & Social Media Editor: Ash Baker
Web & Art Editor: Kaylen Rose


April 2018 – February 2019

Editor-in-Chief: Omaria Sanchez Pratt
Managing Editor: Isabelle Johnson
Fiction Editor: Taylor Sarratt
Poetry Editor: Tiara Brown
Digital Media Editor: Jeremy Flick


May 2017 – April 2018

Editor-in-Chief: Kate Tighe-Pigott
Managing Editor: Evan Arneson
Fiction Editor: Austin Baurichter
Poetry Editor: Sophie Weiner
Nonfiction Editor: Austyn Gaffney


January 2017 – May 2017

Editors-in- Chief: Jordan Hubrich & Amanda Corbin
Senior Editors: Chad Gilpin & Gary Thomas Smith
Interns: Chelsie Abney, Kate Heinonen & Julia Mikulec
Faculty Advisors: Julia Johnson & Gurney Norman