LISA BORDERS

“[A] reliably hilarious satirist.”
— Oldster magazine

Lisa Borders is the author of three novels: Last Night at the Disco, published in 2025 and a finalist for the Foreword Indie Book of the Year in Humor; The Fifty-First State; and Cloud Cuckoo Land, chosen by Pat Conroy as the winner of River City Publishing’s Fred Bonnie Award and a 2003 Massachusetts Book Awards honoree.

 A frequent humor contributor at McSweeney’s, her essays and short fiction have appeared or are forthcoming in Oldster, The Rumpus, Cognoscenti, Black Warrior Review and other journals. She has received grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the Somerville Arts Council and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, and residencies at the Millay Colony, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Hedgebrook, Blue Mountain Center and St. Nell’s.

 Lisa taught for many years at Boston’s GrubStreet, where she founded the Novel Generator program and co-founded the Novel Incubator program. She currently teaches her own Novel Reactor workshops and does private manuscript consulting.

 After growing up largely in Central Jersey – a part of New Jersey whose very existence is the topic of much debate – Lisa moved to the Boston area many years ago and now lives in MetroWest with her partner and two rescue cats.