Bryn Chancellor (she/her) is the author of the novel Sycamore (Harper/HarperCollins 2017), which was a Southwest Book of the Year, an Indie Next and LibraryReads pick, an Amazon Editors’ Best Book of 2017, and among Bustle‘s Best Debuts of 2017. Her story collection When Are You Coming Home? (University of Nebraska Press 2015) won the Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize, and her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The Southern Review, Ecotone, Cimarron Review, Brevity, Colorado Review, and elsewhere. A native of California raised in Arizona and transplanted to the South, she is a grateful recipient of fellowships from the Alabama, Arizona, and North Carolina arts councils and the Poets and Writers Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award. She is associate professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
Education
- M.F.A., Creative Writing (Fiction), Vanderbilt University
- M.A., English Literature, Arizona State University
- B.A., English, Northern Arizona University
Research Interests
Fiction writing, creative nonfiction writing, contemporary American fiction and nonfiction, psychogeography/the writer as walker, comix/graphic narratives
Courses Taught
- ENGL 2202: Contemporary Fiction
- ENGL 2128: Intro to Fiction Writing
- ENGL 3202: Intermediate Fiction Writing
- ENGL 4203/5203: Advanced Fiction Writing
- ENGL 4206: Writing Creative Nonfiction
- ENGL 4209: Special Topics in Fiction Writing
- ENGL 6073: Topics in Creative Writing
Publications
Books
Sycamore: A Novel (Harper/HarperCollins, 2017)
When Are You Coming Home? Stories (University of Nebraska Press, 2015). Winner of the Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize.
Short Fiction
- “Safety First,” Cimarron Review (Fall 2022-Winter 2023): 189-198. Released in 2024.
- “Radio Sky.” Ecotone 33, 18.2 (Spring/Summer 2023): 47-55
- “Remnants,” The Southern Review 58.4 (Autumn 2022): 504-515
- “The Moon, the Pyramids, the World,” NELLE, winter 2019
- “This Is Not an Exit,” descant 53 (Fall 2014): 7-17
- “When Are You Coming Home?” Blackbird 10.2 (2011)
- “All This History at Once.” PMS: poemmemoirstory 10 (2010): 113-117
- “Wrestling Night.” The Yalobusha Review 13 (2008): 101-109
- “The New Girl.” The Fourth River, 4 (2007): 50-58
- “Meet Me Here.” Gulf Coast 18.1 (2006): 12-24
- “At the Terminal.” Blackbird 3.2 (2004)
- “In My Former Life.” CutBank 62 (2004): 42-56
- “Fossil Light.” Phoebe 33. 2 (2004): 98-115
- “Any Sign of Light.” Colorado Review 31. 1 (2004): 34-44
- “Start With the Walls.” The Cream City Review 27. 2 (2003): 31-42
- “Water at Midnight.” swamp pink* 62 (2002): 20-28 *formerly Crazyhorse
Creative Nonfiction
- “Arterial,” swamp pink*, Issue 98, Fall 2020 *formerly Crazyhorse
- “String, Too Short,” Brevity, 14 Jan. 2019
- “Missing Worlds”: personal essay at The Common 21 June 2017
- “How to Write Suspense”: craft essay for Publishers Weekly 5 May 2017
Current Projects
- Novel
- Linked short story collection
Selected Awards and Honors
Writing
- North Carolina Arts Council Artist Fellowship
- Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize
- Poets & Writers Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award
- Jentel Artist Residency
- Hambidge Center Residency
- Alabama State Council on the Arts Literary Fellowship
- Arizona Commission on the Arts fellowship and project grant
- Sewanee Writers Conference Tennessee Williams Scholarship
- Bread Loaf Writers Conference David R. Sokolov Scholarship
Teaching
- English Graduate Student Association Graduate Professor of the Year, 2022
- Accessibility Excellence Award for Outstanding Faculty/Staff, UNC Charlotte, 2017
- Honors Faculty Award, University of Montevallo, 2015
Selected Readings, Panels, Appearances, + Talks
- Southern Festival of Books
- Gertrude & Harold Vanderbilt Visiting Writers Series at Vanderbilt University
- Tucson Festival of Books and Masters Workshop
- Virginia Festival of the Book
- Alabama Book Festival
- Converse College Visiting Writer
- Sensoria: A Celebration of the Literature and the Arts
- Hub City Writers Project/Spartanburg Public Library
- Hoover Public Library
- Prairie Schooner Book Prize Celebration Reading
- Winthrop University Visiting Readers Series
- University of North Carolina at Greensboro Visiting Writer’s Series
- Sewanee Young Writers Conference
- Poets & Writers WEX, McNally Jackson Books, New York City
- UAB Writers Series, University of Alabama-Birmingham
- Auburn Writers Conference Creative Reading Series
- Slash Pine Festival, University of Alabama
- Montevallo Literary Festival, University of Montevallo
Faculty Appointments
- Associate Professor, Department of English, UNC Charlotte, 2019-
- Assistant Professor, Department of English, UNC Charlotte, 2015-19
- Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Montevallo, 2009-2015 (awarded tenure and promotion in April 2015)