About

Elizabeth Marian Charles is a writer, teacher, and mother. She holds a BA in English from Seattle University and an MFA in Fiction from Arizona State University. She was a recipient of the 2017 Piper Global Writing Residency Fellowship in Singapore and Hong Kong, and the 2018 Piper Global Teaching Fellowship at the National University of Singapore. Her college-level teaching work includes first year composition and rhetoric, professional and technical writing, introductory fiction, and intermediate fiction. Additional professional experience includes web marketing and communications and freelance editing. She currently teaches first year composition and professional and technical writing at University of South Florida and is also a Ph.D. student in English Rhetoric and Composition. She is a member of the academic board of the Museum of Motherhood. She is working on a memoir about the life-threatening miscarriage that forced her to reckon with years of grief, trauma, and self-abandonment, and illuminated the desires motherhood had eclipsed.

Publications

• “This Was a Desired Pregnancy,” creative nonfiction, Barren: An Exploration of the Journey to Parenthood (Demeter Press), forthcoming December 2025

• “The Living and Dead Carry On,” creative nonfiction, “The Rebis, Volume 3: The Star”

• “The Lungs Are the Seat of Grief,” novel excerpt, Winner of the Inception Contest, “Sunspot Lit”

• “No Signboard Seafood,” short fiction, “The Woven Tale Press”

• “Checklists for the Apocalypse,” short fiction, “The Minnesota Review”

• “Alpha Bravo Charlie,” short fiction, “Fiction Southeast”

• “Heart,” short fiction, “Bird’s Thumb”

Memoir: Mother of Pearl

MOTHER OF PEARL is an account of the life-threatening miscarriage that forced me to reckon with years of grief, trauma, and self-abandonment, and illuminated the desires motherhood had eclipsed.

I was nearly 14 weeks pregnant when an ultrasound revealed the end of my pregnancy. Within 24 hours, I hemorrhaged, ultimately losing over 40% of my blood volume. Conditioned by a lifetime of suppressing my body’s signals and deferring to authority, I didn’t realize how close to death I had come until after emergency surgery and a blood transfusion—and I didn’t know my choices had been constrained by Texas’s laws.

Over the next year, I grappled with flashbacks and panic attacks as I moved to Florida, returned to teaching, and began a book, all while interrogating narratives of faith, embodiment, and loss. I realized that every crisis in my life—from the eating disorder and suicidal depression that derailed me as a teenager, to my brilliant father’s diagnosis with brain cancer, to his death days before the pandemic while I was pregnant with my son—were cosmic course corrections that had brought me closer to my authentic desires. I rebuilt a life rooted in agency while transcending pathology, silver linings, and maternal sacrifice. But would I risk losing it all again for my daughter, or finally find a way to balance my dreams with the needs of my family? 

I am currently seeking representation for MOTHER OF PEARL.

Conferences and Presentations:

• Museum of Motherhood Conference, Presenter (2025): “Framing Pregnancy Loss as Transformation: A Narrative Approach”

• 13th Annual Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (WGSS) Research Colloquium, Presenter (2024): “Background Research for a Proposed Study on Writing Reproductive Trauma”

• Museum of Motherhood Conference: Threads of Connection, Presenter (2024): “Thirdspace Feminist Practices for Embodying Motherhood in Academia”

• Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writing Conference, Presenter (2019): “Demystifying the Creative Process: Rituals, Self-Care, and Habits for Writers” craft lecture & discussion

• ASU MFA Reading Series Co-Organizer (2017-2018): Co-organized an 8-part reading series featuring ASU graduate students

• Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writing Conference, Panel Moderator (2018): “Re-Visioning: Revising the Manuscript” with Claire Vaye Watkins, Kevin McIlroy, and Alix Ohlin

• Writers’ Craft: An ASU Conference on Craft and Community, Presenter (2018): “Dialogue: The Art of Talking on the Page” fiction craft lecture

• Writers’ Craft: An ASU Conference on Craft and Community, Co-Presenter (2017): “On Beginnings” fiction craft lecture co-presented with Annie Vitalsey

Community Involvement:

• Academic Board Member, Museum of Motherhood, 2023-present

Awards, Acknowledgments, and Fellowships

• Winner, 2019 Inception Contest by Sunspot Lit

• Honorable Mention, 2019 Annual Woven Tale Press Literary competition (judged by Ann Beattie)

• Finalist, 2019 CRAFT Short Fiction Prize (judged by Elizabeth McCracken)

• Finalist, 2018 Aleida Rodriguez Memorial Award

• 2018 Piper Global Teaching Fellowship in Singapore

• 2017 Piper Global Writing Residency Fellowship in Singapore and Hong Kong

• Semifinalist, 2016 Disquiet Literary Contest