Laura Furman

Who is Laura Furman?

Laura J. Furman is an American author best known for her role as series editor for the O. Henry Awards prize story collection. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Mirabella, Ploughshares, Southwest Review.

Furman was born in New York City and attended Hunter College High School and Bennington College in Bennington, Vermont. In 1978, she moved to Texas. After living in Houston, Galveston, Dallas, and Lockhart she settled in Austin with her husband, Joel Warren Barna, and their son.

She has written three collections of stories, two novels, and a memoir.

She taught at the University of Texas at Austin, where she was Susan Taylor McDaniel Regents Professor of Creative Writing. While at UT, she founded the literary magazine American Short Fiction, which was a three-time finalist for the National Magazine Award.

Furman’s most recent book of fiction, The Mother Who Stayed: Stories, was published in February 2011