Elyssa East received her B.A. in art history from Reed College and her M.F.A. in creative writing from Columbia University’s School of the Arts. Dogtown: Death and Enchantment in a New England Ghost Town, Elyssa’s first book, won the 2010 L. L. Winship/P.E.N. New England Award in non-fiction. A Boston Globe Bestseller, Dogtown is an Editors’ Choice selection from The New York Times Book Review and was named a “Must-Read Book” by the Massachusetts Book Awards. Michael Koryta selected Dogtown for Entertainment Weekly's 2010 "You've Gotta Read This" list. Elyssa’s writing has also been published in The New York Times, The Dallas Morning News, The Kansas City Star, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and other publications nationwide. A scene from her opera libretto, Mr. Hawthorne’s Engagement, which tells the true story of Nathaniel Hawthorne's simultaneous secret engagements to two sisters, Sophia and Elizabeth Peabody, was performed with American Opera Project’s Composers and the Voice series.
Before publishing Dogtown, Elyssa created Columbia University’s Artists’ Resource Center and ran KGB Bar’s Columbia University Faculty Selects Reading Series for three years. She has also worked as a baker, an archaeologist’s assistant, a ballet school dorm parent, a nonfiction reviews editor at Publisher’s Weekly, the Managing Director of the Maine Summer Dramatic Institute, and the Executive Producer of Shakespeare in Deering Oaks Park in Portland, Maine. Elyssa has received awards and fellowships from The Corporation of Yaddo; the Ragdale, Jerome, and Ludwig Vogelstein Foundations; the University of Connecticut; and the Phillips Library. She grew up in Georgia and currently lives in New York City where she teaches in the Creative Writing program at Purchase College, State University of New York.
Interviews and articles about Elyssa and Dogtown
Amanda Stern's Happy Ending Reading Series Blog
Select articles and book reviews by Elyssa
“A Moveable Fast” Elyssa's New York Times Thanksgiving Day Op-ed
New York Times Sunday Book Review of THE KILLER OF LITTLE SHEPHERDS by Douglas Starr
New York Times Sunday Book Review of FINDING CHANDRA by Pulitzer Prize-winning authors Scott Higham and Sari Horowitz
New York Times Sunday Book Review of THE POISONER'S HANDBOOK by Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Deborah Blum
Kansas City Star review of DESTINY OF THE REPUBLIC by Candice Millard
Kansas City Star review of I REMEMBER NOTHING by Nora Ephron
Kansas City Star review of LONG FOR THIS WORLD by Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Jonathan Weiner
Kansas City Star review of CAKEWALK by Kate Moses
Photos by Melissa Heltzel
