Dorene O'Brien

Fiction Writer

Detroit, MI

Michigan US

Email:

dobrien@collegeforcreativestudies.edu

Website:

www.doreneobrien.com

Twitter/X:

@dorene_obrien

Author's Bio

Dorene O’Brien is an award-winning Detroit-based writer whose stories have won the Red Rock Review Mark Twain Award for Short Fiction, the Chicago Tribune Nelson Algren Award, the New Millennium Writings Fiction Prize, and the international Bridport Prize. She is also an NEA, a Vermont Studio Center and a Pfeiffer-Hemingway creative writing fellow. Her work has been nominated for three Pushcart prizes, has been published in special Kindle editions, and has appeared in the Baltimore Review, Madison Review, Best of Carve Magazine, Short Story Review, Southern Humanities Review, Detroit Noir, Montreal Review, Passages North, and others. Voices of the Lost and Found, her first fiction collection, was a finalist for the Drake Emerging Writer Award and won the USA Best Book Award for Short Fiction. Her fiction chapbook, Ovenbirds and Other Stories, won the Wordrunner Chapbook Prize in 2018. Her second full-length collection, What It Might Feel Like to Hope, released in 2019, was named first runner-up in the Mary Roberts Rinehart Fiction Prize and won a 2019 gold medal in the Independent Publishers Book Awards (IPPY). She is currently writing a literary/Sci-Fi hybrid novel

Writers Retreats:

Vermont Studio Center

Publications & Prizes

Anthologies:

My Cruel Invention (Meerkat Press, 2015)

XX Eccentric: Stories about the Eccentricities of Women (Main Street Rag, 2009)

Detroit Noir (Akashic Books, 2007)

Books:

What It Might Feel Like to Hope (Baobab Press, 2019)

Voices of the Lost and Found (Wayne State University Press, 2007)

Chapbook:

Ovenbirds and Other Stories (Wordrunner eChapbooks, 2018)

Journals:

42opus

Alkali Flats

Ars Medica: A Journal of Medicine, the Arts, and Humanities

Chicago Tribune

Clackamas Literary Review

Connecticut Review

Corridors Literary Magazine

Curious Rooms

Driftwood Review

Dunes Review

Ellipsis

Fine Print

Higginsville Reader

Hot Metal Press

Houston Literary Review

Kenning

Margin: Exploring Magic Realism

Miranda Literary Magazine

Montreal Review

New Millennium Writings

New Press Literary Quarterly

News From: The Republic of Letters

Night Train

North Atlantic Review

Paper Street

Passages North

Peregrine

Perigee

Phantom Kangaroo

Plum Biscuit

Princeton Arts Review

r.kv.r.y. quarterly

REAL: Regarding Arts & Letters

Red Rock Review

Short Story Review

Silver Quill

The Madison Review

The Rambler

Third Wednesday

THIS Literary Magazine

Tidal Basin Review

Turbulence

Wayne Literary Review

Weave Magazine

Prizes won:

Grants and Scholarships

Pfeiffer-Hemingway Writing Fellow, 2019

Vermont Studio Center Writing Fellow, 2016

National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Grant, 2004

Graduate-Professional Scholarship (Full tuition), Wayne State University, 1997

Loughead Eldredge Creative Writing Grant, Wayne State University, 1997

Tompkins Award in Fiction, Wayne State University, 1997

Tompkins Award in Essay, Wayne State University, 1997

Loughead Eldredge Creative Writing Grant, Wayne State University, 1996

Lenore Upton Scholarship, Women in Communications, 1993

WSU Merit Scholarship (Full tuition), Wayne State University, 1993

Honors and Awards

Independent Publishers Book Award for Short Fiction Gold Medal, 2019

Wordrunner Chapbook Contest Winner, 2018

Mary Roberts Rinehart Prize for Fiction Collections, First Runner-Up, 2017

Baltic Writing Residency Finalist, 2017

Woven Tale Press Fiction Contest, Honorable Mention, 2017

Vermont Studio Center Fellowship, 2016

Wordrunner Chapbook Contest Finalist, 2016

Horatio Nelson Story Collection Finalist, 2015

Finalist, Atlas Review Chapbook Contest, 2015

Finalist, eWordrunner Chapbook Contest, 2015

Nominated for the storySouth Million Writers Award, 2014

International Fish Award Shortlist, 2013

Second Place, Chris O’Malley Prize in Fiction, 2011

Madison Review Fiction Finalist, 2010

Drake Emerging Writer Award Finalist, 2009

Greensboro Review Literary Award for Fiction Finalist, 2009

USA Book News Best Book Award, 2008

Pushcart Prize Nomination, 2008

International Fish Award Shortlist, 2007

New Letters Literary Award Finalist, 2006

Best of Carve Award, 2005

First Place, Bridport International Writing Competition, 2004

Night Train Firebox Fiction Award, 2004

Writer’s Voice Prose Award, 2004

Chicago Tribune Nelson Algren Fiction Award, 2003

First Place, Willamette Award in Fiction, 2003

Writer’s Voice Prose Award, 2003

Pushcart Prize Nomination, 2003

First Place, Wind Magazine Fiction Award, 2002

First Place, New Millennium Award for Fiction, 2002

New Letters Literary Award for Fiction Finalist, 2002

Greensboro Review Literary Award for Fiction Finalist, 2002

Authors in the Park Short Story Contest Finalist, 2002

First Place, Red Rock Review Mark Twain Award for Short Fiction, 2000

Inkwell Fiction Contest, Manhattanville College, Honorable Mention, 1999

First Place, Iowa Literary Awards, Iowa Organization for the Writing Arts, 1998 Peregrine Prize, Honorable Mention, Amherst Writers & Artists Press, 1998

First Place, Metro Times Summer Fiction Contest, 1997

New Letters Literary Awards, University of Missouri, Second Runner Up, 1997

Explorations, University of Alaska Writing Award, Honorable Mentions, 1996, 1997

Personal Favorites

Favorite authors:

Andrea Barrett, Lorrie More, Anthony Doerr, Steven Millhauser, T.C. Boyle, Steart O'Nan, Tom Perrotta, Karen Russell, Francine Prose.

More Information

Gives readings:

Yes

Travels for readings:

Yes

Identifies as:

Polish American

Prefers to work with:

Any

Fluent in:

English

Born in:

Detroit, MI

Michigan

Raised in:

Detroit, MI

Michigan

Please note: All information in the Directory is provided by the listed writers or their representatives.

Last update: Jun 24, 2022