Elizabeth O'Connor

Elizabeth O’Connor is an English writer born in Birmingham. She studied English at Durham University and Shakespeare at King’s College London, then completed a PhD at the University of Birmingham in 2019 on the nature writing of H.D., and has worked at the university since. Her short story Woman with a White Pekingese won the White Review Short Story Prize. Her first novel, Whale Fall (2024), set on an island off the Welsh coast in 1938 and inspired by her grandparents’ island upbringings, received a Betty Trask Award in 2025 and won the Chautauqua Prize.

Timeline of Elizabeth O'Connor’s life

Works

Prizes