Michelle Huneven

Michelle was born in Altadena, California just a mile from where she lives now. Her first two books, Round Rock and Jamesland, were both New York Times notable books and also finalists for the LA Times Book Award. Blame was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and also a finalist for the LA Times Book Award, and Off Course was New York Times Editor’s Choice. Huneven’s fifth novel, Search, comes out April 26, 2022.

Along the way, she has received a GE Younger Writers Award, a Whiting Award for Fiction, and a Guggenheim fellowship. For many years her “day job” was reviewing restaurants and writing about food for the Los Angeles Times, the LA Weekly and other publications. She has received a James Beard award (for “feature writing with recipes”) and an assortment of other awards for food journalism.

She is presently teaching creative writing to undergraduates at UCLA, working on my next novel and writing the occasional bit about food. She lives with her husband Jim Potter, their dog (Tatty Jane), the memory of our cat (Mr. Pancks), a talkative African Grey parrot (Helen) and nine chickens (names on request).