Alexi Zentner

Alexi Zentner is a Canadian American novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter, and professor of English and creative writing at Binghamton University. He earned an MFA from Cornell University and has published fiction and essays in literary magazines and newspapers. Touch, his debut novel, appeared from W. W. Norton in 2011 after its opening material had first reached readers as a short story. The novel is set in Sawgamet, a remote northern mining town shaped by snow, forest, family legend, and the memories of three generations. Zentner blends realistic hardship with elements of myth and the fantastic, making the landscape central to the characters' understanding of love, loss, and survival. Touch was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and shortlisted for Canada's Governor General's Literary Award for fiction. Zentner later wrote The Lobster Kings and Copperhead, while publishing horror under the name Ezekiel Boone. Across these different bylines, his work returns to family inheritance, responsibility, and communities under pressure.