Malena Watrous

Malena Watrous is a writer who dreads being asked the question, “What do you do?” because when people follow up by asking: “Have I read anything you’ve written?” it can be awkward. Then again, awkwardness is one of her favorite emotions to explore in fiction. Malena is also the person writing this bio, and it feels a little awkward to be writing about herself in the third person, even if that’s what fiction writing basically is much of the time (unless of course she’s writing in first person, in which case the veil is even thinner). In addition to fiction, she writes essays and reviews.

She is an instructor of creative writing. She has taught workshops in both fiction and nonfiction at Barnard College and USF’s MFA program, and currently works for Stanford’s Continuing Studies Online writing program, where she co-founded and directs the Online Writing Certificate program in the novel, and also works as a freelance developmental editor.

She is the mother of one son, Max, who turned thirteen this summer and caught up with her in height, as well as the caretaker of two furry muses: an overweight Siamese cat (Stormtrooper, or “Stormo”) and a Pit-huahua pandemic puppy named Lucy. Her husband Matt Schumaker is a new music composer. When she’s not working on her novel, she’s a maker of things that can be finished (and often consumed) in a shorter span of time. She has dabbled in papermaking, pie baking, metalsmithing, and (most often) enjoys sewing the clothes that she wears (as well as shopping for the fabric, which is its own hobby).