Fiona McFarlane, associate professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley, has received The Story Prize for her short story collection, Highway Thirteen (Farrar, Starus, and Giroux, 2024).
Presented annually since 2004, The Story Prize is a $20,000 award presented to the author of the best story collection published in the United States in the preceding year. This year’s award-winning collection from Dr. McFarlane features 12 interconnected narratives about the reverberations of a fictional serial killer in the small town of Barrow, Australia.
At UC Berkeley, Dr. McFarlane serves as director of the creative writing minor and teaches courses on narratives, novels, and creative writing practices. In addition to her latest work, she is the author of three other books: The Sun Walks Down: A Novel (Farrar, Starus, and Giroux, 2023), The High Places: Stories (Farrar, Starus, and Giroux, 2016), and The Night Guest: A Novel (Farrar, Starus, and Giroux, 2013).
A native of Australia, Dr. McFarlane studied English at Sydney University and earned her Ph.D. from Cambridge University in England.