Mary Helen Specht is an associate professor of creative writing. She primarily teaches fiction, including fantastical and flash, and directs the creative writing specialization at St. Edward's. Along with Dr. Sasha West, she also organizes the Marcia Kinsey Visiting Writers Series and the Sorin Oak Review literary magazine.
Mary Helen Specht’s debut novel Migratory Animals (Harper) won the Texas Institute of Letters Best First Fiction Award and the Writers' League of Texas work of Best Fiction. Her writing has appeared and been anthologized in numerous publications, including: The New York Times, Witness, The Colorado Review, Hobart, Prairie Schooner, World Literature Today, Michigan Quarterly Review, and many others. Her next novel, The Mudlark, will be released in 2026 from Ballantine Press (Penguin Random House).
A past Fulbright Scholar to Nigeria and Dobie-Paisano Writing Fellow, Specht was named one of "Ten Writers to Watch" by Texas Monthly. She once worked at a restaurant with an old-timey filling station theme where she had to wear a pin-striped gas station uniform and serve flaming drinks.
MFA in Creative Writing & Literature, Emerson College in Boston, MA
BA in English, Rice University in Houston, TX