In addition to his photography work, Van Sise is both a published author and translator. His written work has earned him residencies at Millay Arts, Serenbe and the New York Public Library; he has been a finalist for the Rattle Poetry Prize and the Travel Media Awards for feature writing, and the winner of the Colonel Darren L. Wright Memorial Writing Award and the the Independent Publishers Book Awards for poetry, as well as the Lascaux Prize for Nonfiction.
Published and Scheduled Literary Work:
Books:
"Children of Grass: A Portrait of American Poetry" (with foreword by Mary-Louise Parker)- Schaffner Press/IPG (full length illustrated book, 186pp, 2019) Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound | Independent Publishers Book Awards gold medal winner | Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year
"Invited to Life: After the Holocaust" (with essays by Dr. Mayim Bialik, Neil Gaiman, and Sabrina Orah Mark) -Schiffer Publishing (full length illustrated book, 224pp, 2022) Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound BookFest gold medal winner
"On the National Language: The Poetry of America's Endangered Tongues" (with contributions by DeLanna Studi, Linda Hogan, Philip Metres, Matthew Lippmann, Crisosto Apache, James Aronhióta's Stevens, Lehua M. Taitano, KT Herr, and dg nanouk okpik)-Schiffer Publishing (full length illustrated book, 176pp, 2024) Anthem Award winner | finalist, Meitar Award for Excellence in Photography
"Four Quartets: Poetry in the Pandemic" - Tupelo Press (contributor; full length illustrated book, 250pp, 2020)
"Untethered: Living the Digital Nomad Life in an Uncertain World" - Exisle Publishing (foreword contributor; full length book, 223 pp, 2023)
Travel Essays:
"A Thorn or Two" - Intrepid Times (travel essay- Kosovo)
"Can You Hear Me Now?" - Nowhere Magazine (travel essay- Outer Mongolia) | featured on The Rumpus's This Week in Essays
"A Treasured Guest" - Intrepid Times (travel essay/humor- Kazakhstan)
"Dinner with Strangers" - Intrepid Times (travel essay- Ireland)
"We'll Kill a Man in the Morning" - Intrepid Times (travel essay- Oklahoma) | finalist for the Travel Media Award for Feature Writing
"Tokyo Rising" - BuzzFeed News (travel essay/humor-Japan)
"The Hostile Mirror" - Atlas Obscura (travel essay - Sardinia)
"High Water" - Wanderlust Magazine (travel essay- Gettysburg, Pennsylvania)
"Daytime Effects" - River River (short travel essay- Great Smoky Mountains)
"Stuffed Reindeer for Sale" - Intrepid Times (travel essay- Arctic Finland)
"Blow Something Up" - Intrepid Times (travel writing suggestions)
Nonfiction:
"Faux Pas" - The Southampton Review (memoir)
"You, or Someone You Know" - The North American Review (essay) | winner of the Lascaux Prize for Nonfiction
"A Life Worth Dying For" - The Intrepid Times (creative non-fiction)
"The Infinite Highway" - The Intrepid Times (creative non-fiction)
"From Parents the Same" - The North American Review (essay)
"Other People's Bodies"- The Los Angeles Review (creative non-fiction)
"Dawn Comes Later" - The Intrepid Times (creative non-fiction)
"Body Language"- Poets & Writers Magazine (essay)
"Rainstorm, South Dakota" - Cutleaf (essay)
"That Others" - Tupelo Quarterly
"No One's From Nowhere" - Eclectica (creative non-fiction)
"Sometimes for Love" - Newfound (creative non-fiction)
"Salvation"- Stonecrop Magazine (creative non-fiction)
"The Night Shift"- Stonecrop Magazine (creative non-fiction)
"Spandex World" - River River (creative non-fiction)
"Bombed at Pearl Harbor" - As You Were (creative non-fiction)
"1000" - Stonecrop Magazine (essay)
"The Year" - Crack the Spine Press (contributor; anthology of short non-fiction)
"Lost, in Translation" - Collateral (military creative non-fiction)
"The Monks of Manhattan" - Photo Brigade (essay with photographs)
Poetry:
"Natural Attraction" - The Los Angeles Review
"October" - Thimble
"Nothingness" - Hayden's Ferry Review
"Divorce" - Museum of Americana
"Fruit Flies" - The Night Heron Barks
"Kfar Aza" - Poets Reading the News
"Training Center Cape May" and "Peterson Air Force Base" - Collateral
"Unhide and Seek" - And So It Goes, the Journal of the Kurt Vonnegut Museum
"Coast Guard Air Station San Francisco" - Line of Advance | winner of the Colonel Darren L. Wright Memorial Writing Award
"Vesuvio" and "Cavalleria Rusticana" - Mantis
"The Civilian Conservation Corps" - Thimble
"174517" - Open Doors Review
"I Don't Think These People in the Video Are Really Stepsiblings", "Morning Before Sin", and "Frank's Tiki Bar, Las Vegas" - Quail Bell Magazine
"To Go" and "The Eusocial Wasp of Queens" - Reverie
"Catching Flies" - Voices in Italian Americana
"Santo Domingo" and "The Man Watching Porn on the 7 Train" - Anacapa Review
"The Best Cake Ever Made in Nassau County" and "Suddenly in Mourning"- Pirene's Fountain | nominee for the Pushcart Prize
"Neruda" - The Moonstone Arts Center
"Persian Flaw," "U Break It U Buy It," and "Unhide and Seek" - B O D Y
"Expulsion" - Santa Clara Review
"Baseball"-Rattle | finalist for the 2022 Rattle Poetry Prize
Fiction:
"Hoping You Are Too" - The MacGuffin
"Bino in the Garden of Good and Evil" - Half and One
"To Whom It May Concern"- Virga Magazine
"New Voice Memo"- Ripples in Space
Reviews and Criticism:
Reviews in The New York Journal of Books