Paulette Livers is a writer, artist, editor, and book designer. Her novel Cementville (Counterpoint Press) received the Elle Lettres Readers Prize and was a finalist for the Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year, the Kentucky Literary Award, and the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize. A MacDowell Fellow, she has been a resident at Artcroft, Ox-Bow, Ragdale, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, and Vermont Studio Center. Her work has been awarded the Meyerson Prize for Fiction and multiple honorable mentions, including the Center for the American West Fiction Prize, Bridport Prize, Hunger Mountain, and Red Hen Press Short Story Award, as well as grants from the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and the Illinois Arts Council.

She earned the MFA at University of Colorado at Boulder, where she taught Creative Writing, and the BA in Fine Art at University of Louisville. With a long career in publishing, art, and design, her credits can be found on the covers and interiors of books around the world. She is founding Creative Director at Mighty Sword Studio, a boutique design, editing, and writing studio helping publishers and writers bring their work to the hands of readers.

Paulette lives to travel, but also lives in Louisville, Kentucky. She spends loads of time with family and friends in Chicago and Colorado, where pieces of her head and heart will always live.