Lori Ann Stephens

Lori’s two passions are teaching composition and writing fiction. She designs the graduate-level Teaching Practicum for Discernment & Discourse and teaches the critical thinking and writing courses. Her dissertation examines the tradition of the grotesque in Southern Literature, specifically the portrayals in mothers and daughters of the American South. She has four published novels, literary fiction and children’s fiction, with traditional and independent presses. Her short stories have been published in journals and anthologies, including Glimmer Train Stories, The Chicago Tribune and Sudden Stories: A Mammoth Anthology of Miniscule Fiction. She also writes novels for adults and children.

Areas of Interest

• Children’s literature

• American literature of the South

• Creative Writing

Awards Distinctions

• Nelson Algren Awards Finalist for “We Could Learn a Lot” (2017)

• RWA National Readers’ Choice Awards for Some Act of Vision (2014)

• Winner of the English National Opera “Minioperas” competition: Librettist (2012)

• Glimmer Train Stories National Fiction Open Award for short story “We Cry for Us” (2004)

Press

"Algren Award finalist: "We Could Learn a Lot" by Lori Ann Stephens," Chicago Tribune, June 10, 2017

Courses Taught

• Discernment and Discourse 1312 and 1313(Undergraduate)

• Teaching Practicum ENGL 6312 (Graduate)