Ellis Avery

Ellis Avery (born Elisabeth Atwood; October 25, 1972 – February 15, 2019) was an American writer. She was the only author to win two Stonewall Book Awards, one in 2008 for her debut novel The Teahouse Fire and one in 2013 for her second novel The Last Nude. The Teahouse Fire also won a Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Debut Fiction and an Ohioana Library Fiction Award in 2007. She self-published her memoir, The Family Tooth, in 2015. Her final book, Tree of Cats, was independently published posthumously.

Early life Born Elisabeth Atwood, Avery was raised in Columbus, Ohio, and Princeton, New Jersey. She legally changed her name to Ellis Avery when she was 18.

Education and career As Elisabeth Atwood, Avery attended Columbus School for Girls in Princeton, New Jersey, from which she graduated a year early, in 1989. While at Princeton Day School, Avery edited and contributed to the literary magazine, Cymbals, After Princeton Day School, Avery attended Bryn Mawr College, graduating in 1993 with an independent major in Performance Studies. She earned an MFA in Writing from Goddard College's low-residency program. Avery taught creative writing at Columbia University, and previously at the University of California at Berkeley. From September 2017 through December 2018, she pursued a nurse practitioner degree at the MGH Institute of Health Professions and was posthumously inducted into Sigma Theta Tau, the Honor Society of Nursing.

Daily haiku Beginning in 2000, Avery wrote haiku daily.

Personal life An out lesbian, her spouse was Sharon Marcus. as such, she was at the forefront of a queer historical fiction movement in which the historical setting is, among other things, an allegory for the queer child awakening to her identity in a household that cannot recognize or name her existence. Avery and her spouse, Sharon Marcus, a professor of English and French literature, influenced each other's work through a shared interest in interrogating received social constructs about women's relationships and lesbian identity in historical contexts. The Teahouse Fire (2006) The Family Tooth (2015) at Public Books. Tree of Cats (2020)

Awards American Library Association Stonewall Fiction Award for The Teahouse Fire and The Last Nude Ohioana Library Fiction Award for The Teahouse Fire Kiriyama Prize Notable Book for The Teahouse Fire for The Last Nude Walter Rumsey Marvin Award for Emerging Writers, Ohioana Library Association, for The Smoke Week