Draft:Dustin Grinnell

Dustin Michael Grinnell is an American fiction writer, essayist, freelance journalist, and marketing writer known for his versatility and skill across various literary genres. . He's the author the sci-fi thriller, The Empathy Academy, collection of short stories, The Healing Book, collection of essays, Lost & Found, and creator and host of the podcast, Curiously.

Dustin Grinnell was born in North Conway, New Hampshire and grew up in Eaton, NH. In childhood, he developed a passion for nonfiction science books as well as speculative fiction, drawing inspiration from authors like Michael Crichton, Kurt Vonnegut, and Stephen King, and TV shows like The X-Files. His fiction writing, especially focused on exploring the unintended consequences of technology, was heavily influenced by dystopian novels, like 1984, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451 as well as TV shows like Black Mirror and sci-fi from Ted Chiang.

Education and Professional Career
Education

After graduating from Kennett High School in North Conway, NH, Grinnell attended Wheaton College (MA) where he was pre-med and studied psychobiology. After graduating college, he worked as a bench scientist at a small biotech company working to develop a neuronal regeneration biologic. In 2008, Grinnell left that job to attend Penn State in Stage College, PA for a master's degree in physiology, where he conducted human performance research at the Noll Laboratory. In the last year of his Master's, he interned at Penn State News as a science writer. After graduating from Penn State in 2009, Grinnell returned to Boston, MA to begin working for organizations in various writing and marketing communications roles while using his spare time to write across a range of genres and formats, including novels, creative nonfiction, journalism, short stories, poetry, plays, and screenplays.

Professional Background

Grinnell has been writing professionally for corporations and nonprofits since graduating from Penn State in 2009 with a MS in physiology. In these various marketing writing roles, he's written a wide range of content—everything from sales letters and fundraising appeals to grant proposals, magazine articles, websites, videos, podcasts, and advertisements. His full-time writing roles include: medical writer at Custom Learning Designs, a copywriter and then communications specialist at Charles River Labs, a science writer at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, a writer and brand journalist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, a copywriter at Bose Corporation, and a senior communications manager at the Albert Einstein Institution. He's now a full-time content marketing manager at WuXi Biologics.

Writing Career
Fiction

As a writer of fiction, Grinnell has published four book-length works and a number of short stories in various literary journals and magazines. He's most notable for his 2023 short story collection, The Healing Book, which was a finalist in the 2023 Best Book Awards and a recommended read from Kirkus Reviews. As a writer of science fiction, Grinnell is also the author of the "Human 2.0" series, in which he delves into the science and ethics of human enhancement technologies in three novels: The Genius Dilemma, Without Limits,  and The Empathy Academy. These sci-fi books explore themes of cognitive enhancement, technological augmentation and ethical dilemmas, offering insights into the future of humanity

Creative Nonfiction

As a writer of creative nonfiction, Grinnell has published two book-length works and has had a wide range of articles and essays appear in various magazines, literary journals and newspapers. He's the author of the 2023 book, Lost & Found: Reflections on Travel, Career, Love and Family, which The US Review of Books called a recommended read, and consists of 23 personal essays that he wrote over the course of ten years. The essays explore Grinnell's travels, family relationships, love and friendship, working for American organizations, and his search to figure out what he wants out of life. He has also published a collection of narrative poems, The Velvet Ghetto, which draws from his experiences working in corporate America.

Screenwriting/Playwriting

As a writer for the screen, Grinnell has written two screenplays, "Play" and "MFA" and a one-act play, "Two Clones in a Room," which was published by the journal, Fleas on The Dog, and was table-read by the author. Grinnell's screenplay, Play, was a finalist in the 2013 Acclaim Scripts Film Contest, a semifinalist in the 2013 Screenplay Festival contest, and a semifinalist in the 2013 Filmmakers International Screenwriting Contest.

Aphantasia & Writing

Grinnell has aphantasia (lacking a mind's eye) and has written and spoken about it publicly. His article in New Scientist in 2016 was one of the first articles to cover the condition after it was official named in 2015 by the scientist Adam Zeman. In 2019, Grinnell was invited to England for the first Extreme Imagination Conference for people with aphantasia and scientists studying the condition. His novel, Without Limits, was featured in the "Inside the Mind's Eye" art exhibition at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter, England. An excerpt of the sci-fi novel was also included in the Extreme Imagination book of art, design and writing. At Exeter University, he led creative writing workshops for scientists, artists and the public. As an aphantasic writer, Grinnell has written articles for The Aphantasia Network, including "How to Write with Aphantasia" and "How to Make Art with Aphantasia." The website also re-published an excerpt from his short story, "A Case of Aphantasia," which originally appeared in the literary journal, Ars Medica.

Travels
Dustin Grinnell has a strong passion for traveling and has explored nearly 20 countries in the past 15 years during vacations and in between jobs. In his junior year of college in 2005, Grinnell studied abroad in Christchurch, New Zealand, where he and friends hitchhiked the country, bungee jumped three times, and skied The Remarkables mountain range. The experience led to a lifelong love of travel. Since then, Grinnell's zest for adventure has taken him across the globe, from climbing Mount Kilimanjaro to running the Paris marathon , from backpacking through Europe, Costa Rica and China, to riding his motorcycle across the United States. His travel experiences have served as fodder for essays that have appeared in many media outlets, earning him recognition from prestigious awards like the Solas Awards and the North American Travel Journalists Association Travel Media Awards Competition.

Articles
As a writer of creative nonfiction, Grinnell's work has appeared in literary journals, magazines, and newspapers, including The LA Review of Books, The Boston Globe , The Washington Post , New Scientist, VICE , Outside.com , Salon, and Writer's Digest, among many others.

Personal Essays

Grinnell is a prolific personal essayist, having published stories on a wide range of subjects, from running the Paris and Newport Marathons, traveling in China where he studied Chinese medicine, standing up what he believes in corporate America, exploring his relationship with his father, experiencing a brush with psychosomatic illness, and riding his motorcycle to Walden Pond and across the United States, among many other topics.

Travel Writing

Grinnell's travels have taken him across continents and he's documented his adventures in various essays, from climbing Mount Kilimanjaro to hitchhiking and bungee jumping in New Zealand. In 2015, he left his corporate job to pursue his passion for writing and travel. That journey was captured in his video, "Finding Words to Live By In Dad's Letters," which was featured on Outside.com. His travel and work experiences culminated in the publication of his 2023 essay collection, Lost & Found: Reflections on Travel, Career, Love and Family.

Freelance Journalism

Grinnell's journalism encompasses a diverse range of topics, from exploring the secret life of a con man  to adverse childhood experiences  to a woman struggling in an BDSM relationship. He has delved into the fascinating world of the Extreme Mustang Makeover, the allure of van life,  the use of reading as therapy (bibliotherapy),  and aphantasia (lack of a mind's eye).

Articles About Writing

As a thought leader on writing and publishing, Grinnell has written 10 articles for Writers Digest.com on the craft of writing, from writing science fiction to narrative journalism.

Podcasting
Grinnell is the creator and host of the podcast, Curiously, which he started in 2023 and draws inspiration from conversation-driven radio shows like the Lex Fridman Podcast. On the podcast, he explores diverse topics and shares compelling stories. Inspired by the 2022 documentary Stutz, in which actor Jonah Hill interviewed his therapy, Grinnell interviewed his former therapy for his first episode. Since then, Grinnell has produced more episodes, featuring guests ranging from a biomedical engineer exploring the science of popular sci-fi films to how artists make money in the digital age with cultural critic, William Deresiewicz.

Awards & Honors
Grinnell's literary achievements span multiple genres, earning recognition from many awards competitions and literary contests. Notably, his books, The Healing Book and The Empathy Academy, both won Gold in The Literary Titan Book Awards and were Distinguished Favorites in the NYC Big Book Awards. His essay collection, Lost & Found, was a finalist in the 2024 Next Generation Indie Book Awards. Grinnell has been recognized for his travel writing with two Solas Awards for Best Travel Writing and an honorable mention from the North American Travel Journalists Association Travel Media Awards Competition. His short fiction and screenplays have also been finalists and semifinalists in various contests.

Personal Life
Dustin Grinnell currently lives in the seaside town of Winthrop, Massachusetts and enjoys the company of his cat, Poe, named after one of his favorite writers, Edgar Allen Poe.

Novels

 * 2023 – The Healing Book
 * 2023 – Lost & Found
 * 2023 – The Velvet Ghetto
 * 2022 – The Empathy Academy
 * 2015 – Without Limits
 * 2013 – The Genius Dilemma

Short Stories

 * "Going Through the Motions," After Dinner Conversations, 2024
 * "Searching for Meaning in the Stars," Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, 2024
 * "Beyond Medicine," parABnormal Magazine, 2023
 * "Cubicle," The AutoEthnographer, 2023
 * "Cured," Ars Medica, 2023
 * "The Dark Side of Destiny," Logos Literature, 2022
 * "An Affable Man," TulipTree's Stories that Need to Be Told Anthology, 2021
 * "The Healing Book," Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine
 * "A Case of Aphantasia," Ars Medica, 2020
 * "Chasing Fireflies at Midnight," Tendon Magazine & Harmony Magazine, 2022
 * "The Good Parent," 45 Magazine, 2020