Dr. Karen Lee Boren

Karen Boren
Department, Office, or School
Department of English
  • Professor

Since 2001, I have been teaching graduate and undergraduate courses in the creative writing program, including fiction and nonfiction prose. I also teach literature courses with topics such as literary images of the writer, women and violence, narratology, and introductory and general education literature courses. Having directed many graduate and senior theses, I know students find this one-on-one tutorial experience as rewarding as I do. I’ve also taught workshops at the Stoke-Newington Literary Festival in London, the Ocean State Summer Writers Conference, and Milliken University’s Annual Literary Festival, and I’ve been a visiting writer at St. Mary’s College in South Bend and Georgia State University.

As for my own work, I write short and novel-length fiction and literary nonfiction prose. I grew up in Milwaukee, WI, which is the setting for my novel, Girls in Peril(2006 Tin House Books), selected for the Barnes and Noble Discover New Writers series. I’ve published short fiction and nonfiction in a variety of venues, including WomenArts Journal, The Florida Review, BookForum, Fourth Genre, The Santa Fe Writer’s Project, and The Best of Lonely Planet’s Travel Writing. My novel Month of Fire was a finalist in the 2013 New American Press book contest. In 2015 New Rivers Press is publishing Mother Tongue: Stories, and I have recently completed the novel Secret Waltz.

You can find out more about me and my writing at karenleeboren.com.​

Education

Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

M.F.A., Wichita State University

B.A., University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Courses

ENGL 220 Intro to Creative Writing
ENGL 371 Advanced Creative Writing: Fiction
ENGL 373 Advanced Creative Writing :Nonfiction Prose
ENGL 460 Seminar In Major Authors & Themes
ENGL 481 Adv. Workshop In Creative Writing
ENGL 490 Directed Study
ENGL 550 Topics
ENGL 581 Workshop in Creative Writing:
ENGL 590 Independent Study
ENGL 591 Directed Reading ​​​​​