Michael Hagen writes fiction shaped by hunger, memory, and the landscapes of rural places. His work blends literary realism and horror, focusing on ordinary lives and the quiet forces that bend them toward inheritance, silence, and return.

His story The Girl Who Ate Her Dreams appeared in Blood+Honey (2026).

Hagen was born in Black River Falls, the town whose history inspired Wisconsin Death Trip. His family has lived in the region since the late nineteenth century, and the lakes, fields, and small towns of the Upper Midwest continue to shape the landscapes of his fiction.

An executive chef for more than twenty-five years, he brings close attention to labor, physical detail, and the rituals of work into his stories. He lives in Missouri and is currently at work on a novel.