Justin successfully defended his dissertation, The Hidden Heart.

Justin’s story, “On Again, Off Again,” was published in issue 19 of Grist.

Justin presented “Narrative at the Tipping Point: Form and Technique in Climate Fiction,” at the 2026 Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture Conference on Literature and Culture.

Justin received a 2025–2026 Charles Phelps Taft Competitive Dissertation Fellowship from the University of Cincinnati’s Taft Research Center.

Justin presented “The Gears of Intimacy and Isolation: Balancing External and Internal Causation in Fiction” on the panel “New Approaches to Colson Whitehead” at the Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture in February 2025.

Justin was named the 2024 winner University of Cincinnati’s Hatfield/Westheimer Short Story Prize.