Michelle Lerner is a multi-faceted talent whose journey has traversed the fields of law, poetry, and now fiction. She began her academic career at Princeton University, where she graduated summa cum laude in 1993 with an AB in Anthropology. She continued her education at Harvard Law School, earning her JD magna cum laude in 1998. Not one to rest on her laurels, Michelle also acquired an MFA in Poetry from The New School in 2008.

She worked diligently for over twenty years as a public interest lawyer. Her life took an unforeseen detour when she was diagnosed with the neurological form of Lyme Disease, putting her on a multi-year path to recovery. This challenging period became a crucible for her creative transformation. Unable to continue her law career, she delved into fiction, writing her debut novel "Ring." The book, slated for publication next year, incorporates her personal experience with chronic illness, although it ventures into realms of imagination she never explored in her legal briefs or her poetry.

Michelle has received numerous accolades for her work across different mediums. Notable among these are her quarterfinalist position in the ScreenCraft Cinematic Book Competition 2023 and being a finalist for multiple prizes, such as the 2020 Book Pipeline Unpublished Contest and the 2021 Fiction Five Contest. Her manuscripts have also earned her a semi-finalist spot for the Pamet River Prize and Willow Run Poetry Book Award. In the world of poetry, Michelle's work has been published in numerous journals like the Virginia Quarterly Review, Connecticut River Review, and LIPS.

Her poetry chapbook "Protection" was published by Poetry Box and received a Pushcart Prize nomination. She also had the honor of being twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize and once for Best New Poets.

Michelle's commitment to community is evident in her service roles. She currently serves as the Executive Director and Board Member of the Laura Boss Poetry Foundation. She also mentors for the organization "We Are Not Numbers," providing guidance to young writers.

As a seasoned public speaker, Michelle has featured in diverse forums including the Delaware Valley Poetry Festival, as well as regional, national, and international conferences.

She resides in Flanders, New Jersey, where she not only nurtures her family but also runs a cat rescue. Her upcoming projects include a collection of personal essays about the opinionated animals she has lived with. In her downtime, Michelle strums a guitar and composes songs that she sings in solitude, celebrating her own inner world.

To explore more of Michelle's diverse body of work, you can visit her website at michellelerner.net.

As the editor of a literary magazine, I love the opportunity to champion novel excerpts. I remember reading RING for the first time. I was immediately immersed in its world, transported to this cold, insular place--a sanctuary both comforting and fraught. The characters all felt so precise, united by grief, but singular in their expressions of it. Lee's grief in particular pulsated through those pages, even as its exact source was a mystery. I was enthralled, and excited by the questions the book raised about community and care. I could tell the novel would be a published book, and I was thrilled to bring a small piece of it to Shenandoah's readers. Of all of the novel excerpts we've published, this remains one of my favorites, and I'm even more thrilled now that the book is out in the world.--BETH STAPLES, EDITOR, SHENANDOAH

A beautiful story of a journey fueled by grief and steeped in love. The pages turned themselves for me.--AMY B. SCHER, BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THIS IS HOW I SAVE MY LIFE

With care and sensitivity, Lerner's gripping book RING takes readers on a journey into Northern Canada to address grief, mental health, suicide, and healing. All too often, the James Bay region is depicted in a bleak portrait, with media coverage highlighting images of despair. In contrast, RING offers strength in connection to the landscapes and more-than-human worlds that animate the main character's grieving process and healing journey. The emotional depth of this novel appears in each sensory detail--the crunch of snow, the taste of cleansing meals, and the touch of companionship to confront feelings of alienation. Readers wanting to learn more about the shadows of loss against the backdrop of Canadian colonialism and the brilliant light of community life when confronting hardship will be inspired and moved by this book. It belongs in the hands of teachers, health professionals, and anyone ready to envision and enact brighter worlds.--SARAH MARIE WIEBE, AUTHOR OF LIFE AGAINST STATES OF EMERGENCY

Michelle Lerner's background as a poet illuminates both the language and story arc of Ring, a novel about recovery after wrenching loss. From the name of the title character, the dog Ring (whose recurring presence acts as a bell slowly tolling to draw the protagonist back to life) to the pitch-perfect descriptions of an icy retreat, this meditation on sorrow shines with well-crafted sentences that feel as if the author is singing you the song of life and death. Lerner doesn't hide her environmental sensibilities in this tale, as she leads the reader through a New Age camp for those pondering whether to continue or to stop their personal journeys. At times dark and unsettling, RING ultimately pulls readers to the brilliant glow of the Northern Lights.--LIBBY STERNBERG, AUTHOR OF THE NOVEL DAISY

Unique and powerful, RING is a stunning, hypnotic book.--ELLEN PALL, AUTHOR OF THE ACCLAIMED NOVEL PLEASE WRITE

In RING, Michelle Lerner's riveting and moving novel, a non-binary parent who has lost their beloved daughter travels to a remote sanctuary in northern Ontario, Canada to prepare themself spiritually to walk into the desolate, snow-covered landscape and end their life. At the sanctuary, they learn various practices that will help them to have a meaningful, conscious death if they decide to go through with it. Compulsively readable and highly recommended.--JEANNE WINER, AUTHOR OF HER KIND OF CASE, A NOVEL WHICH RECEIVED STARRED REVIEWS FROM KIRKUS, BOOKLIST, AND LIBRARY JOURNAL

"It's rare for a novel so well-equipped with the bones and muscle of plot to feel like a profound meditation, but this is exactly what Michelle Lerner's RING felt like to me. Lerner's wisdom about the world seems rooted in her previous work as a poet and public interest lawyer--as well as her experience with chronic illness--but the powers of observation here and the sensitivity of expression made me feel like she was channeling some otherworldly inspiration and transmitting it to us. The spiritual traditions explored here are as lovingly researched as they are artfully rendered--our own journey ends up mirroring the healing sought in these pages. For anyone who has been through the trauma of physical and mental illness, who has yearned for sanctuary across many cultures, who has turned to the animal world to tend to our human anguishes, who longs for a model of turning loss into hope, RING is truly a balm for the psyche. I will never forget this beautiful book."
--Porochista Khakpour, Author of Sick, A Best Book of the Year by Real Simple, Entropy, Mental Floss, Bitch Media, The Paris Review, and LitHub, Time Magazine's Best Memoirs of 2018, and GQ Best Non Fiction Book of 2018

Publisher: Bancroft Press

Pub date: 2025-01-28

Length: 210 pages