Chris Tusa was born and raised in New Orleans. He holds a B.A. in English, an M.A in English, and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Florida. Aside from teaching in the English Department at LSU, he also acts as Managing Editor for Poetry Southeast. With the help of a grant from the Louisiana Division of the Arts, he was able to complete his first chapbook of poetry, Inventing an End. His debut collection of poems, Haunted Bones, was published by Louisiana Literature Press in 2006. His work has appeared in Connecticut Review, Texas Review, Prairie Schooner, The New Delta Review, South Dakota Review, Southeast Review, Passages North, Spoon River, New York Quarterly, Louisiana Literature, Tar River, StorySouth, and others. He has studied under a number of notable writers, including Tim Gautreaux, Sidney Wade, and Debora Gregor. His debut novel, Dirty Little Angels, was released by The University of West Alabama in March of 2009.

Tusa’s stories are, in effect, Southern-fried Greek tragedies. In his work, the backwoods Southern Gothicism of Faulkner and O’Connor intersects with a more contemporary, more urban depiction of the South. Typical themes include mental illness as well as the ways in which the contemporary, celebrity-driven American culture has managed to alter the landscape of the traditional Christ-haunted South.

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» Click here to view Chris’s Curriculum Vitae

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» Click here to view Chris’s Teaching Philosophy

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