A novelist, short story writer, and essayist, in recent years Peter Mountford has also become a popular writing coach and instructor with clients all over the world. His former clients and students have published widely, and include two recent New York Times bestsellers.
Author of the novels A Young Man's Guide to Late Capitalism (2012 Washington State Book Award in fiction), and The Dismal Science (NYT editor’s choice). his next book, a collection of short stories called Detonator, will be out from Four Way Books in 2025.
Peter’s short fiction has appeared in Paris Review, Guernica, Missouri Review (twice), Ploughshares, Southern Review, Zyzzyva, Conjunctions, and Boston Review, where he won second place in the 2007 contest judged by George Saunders. His personal essays have appeared in The Atlantic, New York Times (Modern Love column), The New York Times Magazine, The Sun, Granta, and elsewhere. He’s also contributed feature articles to the Guardian, Writers’ Digest (three times), and elsewhere.
A fellow of Yaddo and Bread Loaf, Peter's work has been awarded grants from The Elizabeth George Foundation, the city of Seattle, 4Culture, and others. In 2016, he received the Gar LaSalle Storyteller Award for a fiction writer in Washington State.
Peter was the events curator at Hugo House, Seattle's writing center, from 2013 to 2018, and is currently on faculty at the low-residency MFA program at Sierra Nevada College. He regularly teaches online and in person through Hugo House and Creative Nonfiction, and is a popular writing coach and manuscript consultant with clients all over the world. To learn more about these services, click HERE.
Born and raised in Washington, DC., apart from three years in Sri Lanka in the early stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War, Peter earned an undergraduate degree in International Relations in 1999. Afterward, he spent two years in Ecuador as the token liberal at a right-wing think tank. He has two kids, and currently lives in Seattle.