Kristyn Dunnion was born in Essex County, the southern tip of Canada, and now lives in Toronto. She earned a B.A. from McGill University in Montreal and an M.A. from the University of Guelph. Dunnion is a deft prose stylist who articulates visceral street-punk and speculative worlds with elegance and heart. Her literary fiction appears in Best Canadian Stories 2020, Orca, Foglifter, Toronto 2033, and many other fine publications. She is one of six Canadian authors featured in Off the Record, edited by John Metcalf (Biblioasis, 2023).
Dunnion is the self-anointed Can Lit Doula and, with compassion and skill, will guide a stuck manuscript to its astounding next draft. She facilitates innovative workshops for emerging and established writers, and currently teaches writing courses at the University of Calgary’s School of Continuing Education. For years Dunnion was a community mental health support worker and healthy food advocate in her neighbourhood. A queer punk performance artist, Dunnion also played bass in Heavy Filth (2008-2011) and Bone Donor (2014-2017).
“No one writes like Kristyn Dunnion, not even those of us who really, really want to. Just how many lives has Dunnion lived exactly, to be able to write like this? Because you believe every word and walk beside every character.”
~ Cherie Dimaline, internationally best-selling author of Empire of Wild, VenCo, and Governor General Award and Kirkus Prize winning The Marrow Thieves
“Kristyn Dunnion is a sharply observant chronicler of the marginal urban experience. In these tightly written stories, nobody gets a break.”
~ Ian Colford, Miriamichi Reader Review of Stoop City
“Dunnion is a master of reality gore.”
~ EDGE Palm Springs
“Pushing the YA envelope about as far as it can go without being an actual mail bomb.”
~ Montreal Mirror, on Big Big Sky
“This novel by Toronto’s Kristyn Dunnion is gritty, sexy and brutal.”
~ MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL, on The Dirt Chronicles
“Dunnion cooks up a dozen sad, pretty, lonely stories and shoots them into whatever unused vein she can find on her audience.”
~ THIS Magazine, on The Dirt Chronicles
“Dunnion assembles a memorable cast of dykes, she-males and wannabe rock stars.”
~ HERIZON, on MOSH PIT
“The teen underworld Dunnion so convincingly creates may traumatize some adult readers, as S.E. Hinton did a generation ago.”
~ Quill and Quire, on MOSH PIT