David Nikki Crouse is an award-winning short story writer with twenty-five years of experience teaching fiction at the graduate and undergraduate levels. Their work has been awarded the Flannery O'Connor Award in Short Fiction, the Mary McCarthy Prize, the Lawrence Prize, the Witness Short Fiction Award, and other prizes.

David Nikki lives in Seattle, Washington, where they direct the Creative Writing Program MFA at the University of Washington-Seattle and serve as the W. Wilson and Grace M. Pollock Endowed Professor in Creative Writing.

David Nikki's new release, Equipment for Lovers, will be published by Dzanc Books in April 2027.

With their trademark deftness, Crouse’s fifth collection returns to themes of alienation and identity, delivered with an ever-sharper edge. These are stories spilling over with compassion and outrage and bittersweet understanding. Winner of the 2025 Dzanc Short Story Collection Prize, Equipment for Lovers explores strangers and strangeness in twelve intimate, uncanny stories perfect for fans of Don DeLillo and Torrey Peters.

You can learn more about this new release and read excerpts from other publications through the Stories page.