Lori Ostlund


Lori Ostlund is an American short story writer and novelist. She is the author of two story collections, The Bigness of the World and Are You Happy?, and the novel After the Parade.

Early life and education

She grew up in a town of 400 people in central Minnesota, where her parents owned a hardware store. She graduated from Minnesota State University Moorhead and from the University of New Mexico with an M.A.

Career

Since 2023, she has been the series editor of the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction, an award she has previously won. She has taught ESL and Creative Writing. She currently works as a freelance developmental editor.
Her work has appeared in many journals, including The Georgia Review, New England Review, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Bellingham Review, Hobart, and Blue Mesa Review. Her story "All Boy" appeared in The Best American Short Stories 2010 and "Just Another Family" appeared in The Best American Short Stories 2024. She has also received an O. Henry Award.

Personal life

She has lived in New Mexico, Spain, Malaysia, North Carolina, and California. She met her wife, the writer Anne Raeff, in New Mexico in 1989, and they have lived in San Francisco, starting 2005.

Selected works

Novel

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Collections

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Short stories

  • "Just Another Family", New England Review ; chosen for The Best American Short Stories 2024
  • "The Bus Driver", STORY ; republished in We Can See into Another Place: Mile-High Writers on Social Justice
  • "Are You Happy?", Colorado Review
  • "A Little Customer Service", ZYZZYVA ; republished in LitHub; included on list of Other Distinguished Stories in The Best American Short Stories 2017
  • "The Sunday Rumpus Interview: Anne Raeff". Interviewed Anne Raeff, Flannery O'Connor recipient.
  • "The Vice", At Length
  • "Passing through Needles", Colorado Review
  • "Leaving Walter", The Common
  • "The Peeping Toms", The Kenyon Review
  • "The Gap Year", The Southern Review ; included on list of Other Distinguished Stories in The Best American Short Stories 2014; reprinted in New Stories from the Midwest
  • "Clear As Cake", ZYZZYVA
  • "The Lent Boy", The Iowa Review
  • "Of All Places", This Land Press ; reprinted in A Voice Was Sounding: Selected Works from This Land Vol. 1 & 2 ; reprinted in Imaginary Oklahoma: 46 Takes on the 46th State
  • "Aaron Englund, July 1970", novel excerpt, Nashville Review
  • "The Day You Were Born", New World Writing, 2011
  • "The Excursion", novel excerpt, Bluestem, 2011
  • "The Knot", The Wordstock 10
  • "All Boy", New England Review ; Best American Short Stories 2010, edited by Richard Russo and Heidi Pitlor; Port Magazine ; Storyville
  • Bed Death," The Kenyon Review ; 2011 PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories, edited by Laura Furman
  • "The Bigness of the World", Bellingham Review
  • "Talking Fowl with my Father", New England Review
  • "Nobody Walks to the Mennonites", Blue Mesa Review
  • "Upon Completion of Baldness", Hobart
  • "And Down We Went", Five Chapters
  • "Idyllic Little Bali", Prairie Schooner
  • "Dr. Deneau's Punishment", The Georgia Review
  • "The Children Beneath the Seat", New England Review
  • "In Heat", Beloit Fiction Journal
  • "Disconnected", Primavera
  • "Tepezcuintle", Northwest Review
  • "Becoming Crystal Sterling", ''American Literary Review''