The Valley offers many opportunities for artists — but as one local writer knows, stepping outside the area can help, too. Northampton writer, teaching artist and graduate instructor Richie Wills was recently selected as a recipient of the Northampton Arts Council’s BJ Goodwin Fund. The grant awards money to local creatives on a reimbursement basis, making it possible for them to travel outside the Valley for professional opportunities.
Wills, the reviews editor at The Massachusetts Review and a Point Foundation Scholar, received praise from Brian Foote, Northampton’s director of arts and culture.
“We are thrilled to support Richie’s development as a writer through this grant,” Foote said in a statement. “Investing in the professional growth of our local artists is essential to maintaining the long-term cultural vitality of Northampton.”
The fund honors the late dancer, performer and educator BJ Goodwin. Past recipients include bands like And The Kids, Sun Parade and Lux Deluxe, who used the funding to attend SXSW Music Festival & Conference in Austin, Texas; muralist Justin Norris, who used the funding to take part in an artist-in-residence program in Chemnitz, Germany; and musician Lucas Solórzano, who volunteered as a music teacher at the Bachata Academy of The DREAM Project, a nonprofit in Cabarete, Dominican Republic.
Wills’ partner, musician Indë Francis, is a member of the Arts Council but was not involved in the selection. Wills applied for and received the funding from Foote before Francis was even aware he had applied.
Wills will apply his $750 grant toward his remaining tuition for the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing Summer Writers’ Conference, for which he already won a Poet & Author Fellowship, which covers part of his conference tuition. There, he plans to refine “Akata Boy,” the novel-length thesis he recently defended for his Master’s of Fine Arts program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
“I had been really anxious and nervous about not being able to afford to attend the writing conference in Martha’s Vineyard, so I was full of gratitude that I was able to receive support,” Wills said. “It felt really great.”
The conference features seminars where participants can make new work, manuscript review sessions, readings, panel discussions and other programming to help up-and-coming writers develop their work and their skills. As Wills put it, his participation in the conference is “meant to pour — both pour into me and also pour into the project.”
“It’s wonderful to be around other writers who take their work very seriously, and to be in a literary space is always an amazing opportunity for any writer, particularly for me,” Wills said.
“Akata Boy” is a coming-of-age story about a character moving between Nigeria — Wills’ home country — and the United States. It explores exile, family structures and the intersection of queer and migrant identities.
Wills plans to spend the summer revising the manuscript and its structure to begin querying agents at publishing houses this fall. Despite the fickle nature of publishing, Wills is confident; several agents have already requested to read the completed work. He anticipates that the book should be in print in 2027 or 2028.
“I can only say that I hope that it will be picked up by this fall, and I believe that it will, because I believe in what I’m doing,” he said. “And I think I’m really creating something powerful and important that I think will be of interest to agents.”
Wills said he hopes his writing will help others connect and “expand the horizons of what people thought might have been possible,” encouraging readers to step outside their own perspectives to foster deeper empathy and dialogue.
“I think my biggest goal as a writer is really just to get people to open up, whether it is that they feel seen in the stories that I’m writing or that it introduces something new for them. In both of those contexts, I’m hoping that it gets to open them up to something deeper — something they can resonate with and connect with,” he said. At a time when migrant communities and queer communities — two groups whose experiences Wills’ work centers — are under fire, “These kinds of stories are even more important,” he said, “just like these grants are even more important.”
To keep up with Wills, visit instagram.com/richie._.wills. For more information about the BJ Goodwin Fund, visit northamptonartscouncil.org/bj-goodwin-fund.
