Kendra Atleework

Freelance Writer & Editor

Germany

I am an award-winning author, freelance writer, and editor. I love writing about nature and place and helping other writers develop and share their ideas.

My first book, Miracle Country, won the Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award, among others, and was highlighted by The New York Times. I hold a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction Writing, and my writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Best American Essays, and elsewhere.

Portfolio
Slow Travel Berlin
07/22/2025
The Art of Translation

Two country bumpkins step blinking out of the train station and into Berlin. “Look at us,” I say to Patrick. “We’re two country bumpkins in Berlin.”

Territory
Dawn of Tomorrow

Kendra Atleework's essay 'Dawn of Tomorrow' explores the history of water usage in California amidst the author's father's job as a mapmaker and the uneasy legacy of Los Angeles civil engineer William Mulholland. Atleework visits Mulholland's grave in Forest Lawn Memorial Park in this work for Territory, a literary journal about maps and other strange objects.

The Atlantic
Power Lines Are Burning the West

Human technology is responsible for more loss from fire than any other cause. But reducing fire's impact will require changes to how people live, not just to the infrastructure that lets them do so.