M. Rickert has published the short story collections Map of Dreams, Holiday, and You Have Never Been Here. Her stories have been collected in numerous anthologies including American Fantastic Tales, The Big Book of Ghost Stories, Nightmares: A New Decade of Modern Horror, and Shadows and Tall Trees 7. She is the winner of the Crawford Award, World Fantasy Award and Shirley Jackson Award. Her first novel, The Memory Garden, won the Locus award. Before earning her MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts she worked as a kindergarten teacher, coffee shop barista, Disneyland balloon vendor and personnel assistant in Sequoia National Park. She currently lives in Wisconsin where she is working on a new novel, and teaching yoga.