The Bad Art Friend Saga

If you had any access to literary Twitter during 2021, you probably heard about Robert Kolker’s New York Times feature piece “Who Is The Bad Art Friend?”

In it, he detailed the riff between Sonya Larson and Dawn Dorland. It all started when Dawn Dorland added her writer friend Sonya to her private Facebook group, where she documented her kidney donation process. It seemed Sonya found the shares self-indulgent, and when Dawn direct messaged Sonya to ask her why she hadn’t “liked” any of the posts in the private Facebook group, Sonya took to a short story.

It centered on a white woman who donated her kidney to a Chinese-American cynic coping with alcoholism. In the story, the donor is villainous in her expectation of praise for her gift. Sonya also used parts of a personal letter Dawn wrote to the recipient of her kidney and shared in her private Facebook group.

The drama is multifaceted and resulted in two lawsuits that finally found their resolution in 2023.

This episode is part of Missing Pages, Season 2 — a podcast series centered on publishing industry shifts, related controversies, and the literary grifters involved.

Listen here.