Laura Crossett

Laura Crossett is now a librarian, but, in an inverse of most people's career moves, she got her start as a writer. After studying Greek in college, she began writing for the local alternative press in Iowa City and publishing her own work online in 1999, and in 2003, she received an MFA from the Nonfiction Writing Program at the University of Iowa, where she taught rhetoric and nonfiction writing to undergraduates for three years. She was a reviewer and later a columnist for the Iowa City/Cedar Rapids ICON and then the Daily Iowan.

After stints as a gift packager and a dog walker in suburban Chicago while writing for the short-lived Third Coast Press and Chicago Indymedia, Crossett started library school, earning an MLIS from Dominican University in 2007. She has worked as a librarian in Franklin Park, Illnois and Meeteetse, Wyoming and is now the Adult Services Coordinator at the Coralville Public Library in Coralville, Iowa, adjacent to the more infamous Iowa City.

Her writing has appeared in little-known literary magazines and less known zines (although perhaps that should be the other way around) as well as online, where her blog post "The Medium is the Message" won Best Overall in the 2005 Electronic Frontier Foundation Blog-a-thon.

She published her first book, Night Sweats: An Unexpected Pregnancy in 2013. She lives in Iowa City with her son and two obstreperous cats.