CHRIS ORCUTT has written professionally for 25 years as a novelist, journalist, scriptwriter, playwright and speechwriter. He has also taught high school U.S. history and college writing. As a newspaper reporter he received a New York Press Association award.
Chris is the author of the critically acclaimed Dakota Stevens Mystery Series. The first novel in the series, A REAL PIECE OF WORK, was an Amazon bestseller and achieved a #1 top-rated ranking in Literary Fiction for Kindle, and #4 in Mystery.
Chris considers himself first and foremost a general practitioner in fiction writing, and has written a great deal of non-genre fiction. He has had well over two dozen short stories published in literary journals, and his short fiction has won a few modest awards, most notably 55 Fiction's World's Shortest Stories. Chris's short story collection, THE MAN, THE MYTH, THE LEGEND, was selected by IndieReader as one of the Best Books of 2013.
In April 2014, Chris published a ONE HUNDRED MILES FROM MANHATTAN which was selected by IndieReader as a Best Book for 2014. In a review of the novel, Kirkus Reviews favorably compares Chris to Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Cheever. His 2017 memoir PERPETUATING TROUBLE moved The Midwest Book Review to write, "absolutely fascinating and entertaining read from cover to cover..." and Kirkus Reviews to write "Orcutt's writing style is lighthearted and conversational...[readers] are sure to find him a vibrant character and enjoyable writer."
In his free time away from the writing desk, Chris enjoys cross country skiing, hiking, mountain climbing, golf, tennis, swimming, chess, and classic films.