About Christopher Coake

Author Christopher Coake

Favorite Activity (not related to writing): playing guitar, photography, and teaching.
Favorite place to go when thinking through a plot issue or book idea: A walk in the desert.
Favorite Author: Alice Munro
Favorite Books: Any Munro story collection; Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried; Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House
Favorite Movie: The Sweet Hereafter (Director: Atom Egoyan)
Favorite Pastime: Collecting typewriters and fountain pens.
Favorite Speech and Why: Faulkner’s Nobel acceptance speech. It’s earnest and may be overblown, but so is “Eye of the Tiger.”
What do you most like about being an author: I find endless fascination in trying to make the hardest things to say, thrilling to read.

Do you teach on a specific topic?

Yes: creative writing.

What specialized skills or knowledge do you have?

I love to teach writers working in both “literary” and genre writing.

Boards: The University of Nevada Press Editorial Advisory Board
Universities: The University of Nevada, Reno. (Grad of the MFA program at Ohio State and the MA program in creative writing at Miami U of Ohio). Also attended Ball State University as an undergrad, with a degree in teaching secondary education (English).
Teaching: Associate Professor and MFA Program Director at U of Nevada, Reno. I also direct the UNR Summer Youth Writing Program for local high school students.

You Came Back: An Italian-language feature-length adaptation, Sei Tornato, is currently in production in Italy, for release in 2020.

The PEN/Robert Bingham Fellowship in 2006.
Named one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists in 2007.
My short story “All Through the House” was anthologized in Best American Mystery Stories 2004 and The Best American Noir of the Century, both by Houghton Mifflin.
“Getaway,” from You Would Have Told Me Not To, was a Distinguished Story in Best American Short Stories 2019.

A strange fantasy novel that is equal parts H.P. Lovecraft, N. K. Jemisin, and Italo Calvino.

Twitter: @chriscoake

Facebook: @AuthorChristopherCoake

You Would Have Told Me Not To