Emme Lund is an author living and writing in Portland, OR. She has an MFA from Mills College. Her work has appeared in Electric Literature, TIME Magazine, The Rumpus, Romper, the Portland Mercury, and Autostraddle, among many other venues. In 2019, she was awarded an Oregon Literary Arts Fellowship in Fiction. Her debut novel, The Boy with a Bird in His Chest (Atria Books, 2022) was longlisted for the First Novel Prize from the Center For Fiction, is a finalist for an Oregon Book Award, was named a best book of the year by Buzzfeed and The Portland Mercury, and was included on lists in The Washington Post, USA Today, People Magazine, The Advocate, Cosmopolitan, and Shondaland.
If you would like to contact Emme, you can reach her through the contact page.
Praise For Emme’s work
On The Boy with a Bird in His Chest (Atria Books February 15, 2022)
“Lund has created a fable for our age: a modern coming of age full of love, desperation, heartache and magic. An honest celebration of life and everything we need right now in a book.”
– Andrew Sean Greer, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Less
“Emme Lund’s The Boy with a Bird in His Chest is a beautiful, tender book. I was deeply moved by this story; very caught up in the ways in which family, grief, love, queerness, and vulnerability all intersect. Lund’s sentences are sweet and stick to your ribs. I found myself falling in love with these characters—these messy, deeply realized, fully lovable, and wonderfully human people. The Boy with a Bird in His Chest is a terrific first novel and Emme Lund is a profoundly gifted writer.”
– Kristen Arnett, New York Times bestselling author of Mostly Dead Things and With Teeth
“The Boy with a Bird in His Chest is a beautiful and atmospheric allegory for what we hide in the world, executed with tense lyricism.”
– Christine Hyung-Oak Lee, author of Tell Me Everything You Don’t Remember
“Emme Lund’s The Boy with a Bird in His Chest is the queer coming of age novel I wish I’d had when I was a teenager. Funny and gutting, tender and scorchingly honest, surreal and a little too real, this novel captures the pain and joy of learning to live with your body and all its desires. The Boy with a Bird in His Chest reads like The Perks of Being a Wallflowers written by Kelly Link. Lund’s vision is striking, resonant, and unforgettable.”
– Isle McElroy, author of The Atmospherians, a New York Times Editors’ Choice
“The burden of living with a secret is poignantly rendered and illuminating for those who seek to understand living a life outside the ordinary.”
– The Washington Post
“Lund’s novel bursts through our 2022 malaise with a new, and necessary kind of storytelling, one that gives a roadmap for moving through trauma to a place of healing.”
– Stacy Brewster for the Oregonian
“Lund’s accomplished debut imagines an LGBTQ allegory with a blend of magical fantasy and stark reality. [. . .] Lund’s emotive prose treats Owen’s burgeoning development with grace and care. This fine effort succeeds at bringing new life to the coming-of-age story.”
– Publishers Weekly
On The Sacred Text of Rosa who is Great (Quiet Lightning Books 2016)
“I have been looking for this book for years! Against every modern trend: a brilliant, old-world, handmade piece of magic.”
– Andrew Sean Greer
“If it’s true that “gods need to speak to us in the middle of the day” and so they will “push us into sleep, forcing us into naps or quick dozes at the table,” then The Sacred Text of Rosa Who Is Great might well be the moment before waking. Urgently manifesting as media & medium, [Emme] Lund & Stella Peach have offered up the greatest gift: a vivid prophecy in dream, remembered.”
– Meg Day
“I’m always fighting with someone or fighting for something. I am fighting the evictions that are happening at an alarming rate in San Francisco. I am fighting as an artist and as a member of my community. I’m not a very happy person these days. On rare occasions, I get packages in the mail. I received this tiny little book in the mail full of colorful illustrations and beautifully crafted sentences. It made me happy for a minute. I devoured its words and in doing so, I stumbled upon a little sentence that reminded me of my sadness. “To be happy is to be unaware.” Thank you [Ms.] Lund for this seemingly simple reminder and thank you for this book. It is a necessary read.”
– Truong Tran
Emme Lund 