Kristen Iversen is an American writer of nonfiction and fiction. Her books include Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats, Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth and Shadow Boxing: Art and Craft in Creative Nonfiction. She is a Professor in English and Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati and Literary Nonfiction Editor of The Cincinnati Review. Iversen will be a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Bergen, Norway in 2020-2021.
Life and work
Kristen Iversen was born in Des Moines, Iowa, and grew up in Arvada, Colorado, near the Rocky Flats nuclear weaponry facility. Her father was an attorney and her mother worked as a public health nurse. Iversen received a BA in English from the University of Colorado at Boulder and worked as a travel writer in Europe for several years before returning to the states to earn a Ph.D. in English and Creative Writing from the University of Denver. Iversen has taught at universities around the country, including the MFA programs at San Jose State University and Naropa University. She served as director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing at the University of Memphis and as editor-in-chief of The Pinch, an award-winning literary journal. During the summers, she has taught in the MFA Low-Residency Program at the University of New Orleans, held in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and Edinburgh, Scotland. She is also a Faculty Mentor in the at Regis University in Denver, Colorado. As of June 2015, Iversen teaches in the Ph.D. program in Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati, where she also serves as Literary Nonfiction Editor of and is a . She also serves as Director of the in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. She is the author of ', a book of memoir and investigative journalism that traces her experience of growing up in a small Colorado community near Rocky Flats, a secret nuclear weapons plant once designated as “the most contaminated site in America.” Iversen later worked at the plant herself. Full Body Burden won the and the . It was also chosen one of the Best Books of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews and the American Library Association, and 2012 Best Book about Justice by The Atlantic. The book was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Award and the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence. In 2012, an excerpt from Full Body Burden was published in the June 11th edition of The Nation. Many universities have chosen Full Body Burden for their First Year Experience/Common Read programs and it has been translated into several languages. This book is being made into a documentary film: , which is purported to come out in Fall 2020. Iversen also edited an anthology of essays and articles about Rocky Flats by various experts around the country entitled , forthcoming in August 2020. A collection of literary essays, , co-edited with David Lazar, is forthcoming October 2020. Her textbook, ', was the first book in its field to cover the subgenres of creative nonfiction. Iversen's first book, , is a biography of Margaret Tobin Brown, known to history as “the Unsinkable Molly Brown.” The book won the Colorado Book Award for Biography and the Barbara Sudler Award for Nonfiction and formed the basis for seven documentaries, including the A&E Biography Molly Brown: An American Legend and . A new edition of the book was published in 2018. In 2020, a revival of opened in New York, based on Iversen's book. Her essays and stories have appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, , and many other publications. Kristen Iversen is currently working on a literary biography of Nikola Tesla, which has involved extensive research trips throughout the United States and Europe. Iversen is married and has two sons. She divides her time between Cincinnati, Ohio and Westcliffe, Colorado.
''Full Body Burden'' summary
Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats is a 2012 memoir fusing Iversen's personal story of growing up in Cold War America with the history of the former Rocky Flats Nuclear Plant near Denver, Colorado, once called by the Department of Energy “the most contaminated site in America.” From 1952 to 1989 there were many fires, leaks, and other mishaps at Rocky Flats. The area became severely contaminated, and little attention was paid to containment and environmental remediation. Carl J. Johnson, director of health between 1973 and 1981, led research into contamination levels and adverse effects on public health, until his employment was terminated. His research results were supported and confirmed by many subsequent studies. indicate that areas on and near the Rocky Flats site are still contaminated with plutonium and may pose a significant health risk.
