
Mary Allen is the author of a literary memoir, The Rooms of Heaven, published by Alfred A. Knopf and Vintage Books. She received an NEA grant for another book-length memoir, Awake in the Dream House. Her work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Real Simple, Library Journal, CNN On-line, Shenandoah, Tiferet Journal, The Chaos, and Beloit Fiction Journal, and in the anthology If I Don’t Make It, I Love You: Survivors in the Aftermath of School Shootings. She won Tiferet Journal’s yearly spiritual writing contest in 2013 and received an honorable mention in that contest in 2019. She received an M.F.A. from The University of Iowa Writers' Workshop and has taught in the Nonfiction Writing Program at The University of Iowa. She lives in Iowa City and is a full-time writing coach.