Patricia A. Smith

Patricia (Patty) Smith is the author of The Year of Needy Girls, a Lambda Literary Award finalist. Her fiction has appeared in Blue Mountain Review, The Master’s Review, So to Speak, and The Tusculum Review. A three-time Pushcart nominee, her nonfiction has most recently been featured in InkFish Magazine, with other work appearing in such places as Hippocampus, Feels Blind Literary, Broad Street, Salon, Prime Number, and several anthologies. Her short fiction was selected for From Page to Stage, choreographed and performed by Starr Foster Dance Co. in Richmond, VA. Her work has also been nominated for Best of the Net, and most recently, she was awarded the Hebestreit Award for Adventure Writing from the National English Honor Society. A repeat Fellow of the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, in 2025, she was given the Emyl Jenkins Award by the James River Writers for inspiring a love of writing. 

A graduate of Wesleyan University, Patty earned her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University. Since 2006, she has taught Dual Enrollment English and literary arts at the Appomattox Regional Governor’s School in Petersburg, VA. With 40 years of teaching experience, she is deeply committed to helping students harness the power of storytelling—as both artists and academic thinkers. In 2021, she was appointed to the Governor’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Board by Governor Ralph Northam and served as Education Chair. Earlier in her career, she taught French at The Pike School in Andover, MA where she received a Fulbright Teacher Exchange, and spent a year teaching in Ziguinchor, Senegal. She lives in Chester, VA with her wife.