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About Michael

Baltimore County

I am a literary artist, working in fiction and nonfiction. Though I've lived all over the country, I've called Baltimore home since 2007, living first in the city and for the last two years just across the city line in Baltimore County.

I've authored three books and published individual stories and essays in some of the country's top literary journals including Kenyon Review, Ploughshares, Missouri Review, Southern Review, and Georgia Review. A one-time newspaper reporter, I shifted… more

View Michael's Resume
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FLASH NONFICTION: Isn't It Fun How We Shine?

ISN'T IT FUN HOW WE SHINE? is a collection of flash nonfictions, made possible in part by a Rubys Artist Project grant. The Rubys were conceived and initiated with start-up funding from the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation and are a program of the Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance. Several of the flash essays will appear this winter in The Southern Review. Others have already appeared at Sport Literate and at Literary Hub. With more than 50 written, I plan to turn them into a limited-run podcast.




  • The Morning After His Family Buried Freddie Gray
    The Morning After His Family Buried Freddie Gray
    This essay was part of a collection by Baltimore authors following the Baltimore Uprising. The essays were solicited by the journal American Short Fiction.
  • Double Play, from Sport Literate
    "Double Play" was one of the first flash essays I wrote as part of the project, ISN'T IT FUN HOW WE SHINE? It was originally published in the journal, Sport Literate.
  • The Morning After: Podcast
    This is the recorded version of "The Morning After His Family Buried Freddie Gray," read by the author. Copyright Michael Downs, 2016.
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    • FICTION: The Greatest Show

    THE GREATEST SHOW: STORIES, a collection of ten linked short stories published by Louisiana State University Press. Three of the stories received special commendation in the Best American Short Stories series as "distinguished stories."

    THE BOOK
    Fire sweeps along the wall of a circus tent while inside thousands of people enjoy a Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey matinee. Within minutes, flames consume the canvas and vast sections collapse, killing 168 people and injuring hundreds more.

    Inspired by the 1944 Hartford Circus Fire, the interconnected stories in Michael Downs's The Greatest Show explore how kindness and time work in the aftermath of disaster.

    • Greatest_Baker.jpeg
      Greatest_Baker.jpeg
      The book cover for "The Greatest Show: Stories," published by Louisiana State University Press as part of its Yellow Shoe Fiction series. The cover was designed by Laura Gleason.
    • ania.pdf
      The story "Ania," first published in The Georgia Review, opens the collection "The Greatest Show."
    • Foreword Magazine reviews THE GREATEST SHOW
      This review of THE GREATEST SHOW from Foreword magazine calls the book, "an auspicious fiction debut."

    • VIDEO AND ESSAY: Thank God We Are Always Surprised

    In a moment of national horror – the bombing at the Boston Marathon – I received a request to present the keynote speech at the Maryland State Arts Council banquet honoring recent awardees. The coincidence sparked a meditation on the role of art in the worst of times, which I presented at the ceremony and later published at the website Baltimore Fishbowl. The written essay can be found here.
    • Maryland writer Michael Downs delivers Keynote at 2013 Individual Artist Awards
      A video of a keynote speech written and presented for the Maryland State Arts Council's annual awards banquet.
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    FICTION: The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist: A Novel

    "Pain has no limits. It's infinite. Like God."

    This novel, published by Acre Books in May 2018, reimagines the life of Horace Wells, a Connecticut dentist and anesthesia pioneer. Its first chapters received a grant from the Maryland State Arts Council. It was a finalist for the Foreword Book of the Year in Historical Fiction. The Los Angeles Review of Books called it "hypnotic" and "a fascinating story."

    In December 1844, Wells encountered nitrous oxide, or laughing gas—then an entertainment for performers in carnival-like theatrical acts—and began administering the gas as the first true anesthetic. His discovery would change the world, reshaping medicine and humanity’s relationship with pain.

    But that discovery would also thrust Wells into scandals that threatened his reputation, his family, and his sanity—hardships and triumphs that resonate in today’s opioid epidemic and our ongoing grappling with what hurts us and what we take to stop the hurt.

    • A tool of 19th-century dentistry for the cover
      A tool of 19th-century dentistry for the cover
      The cover of THE STRANGE AND TRUE TALE OF HORACE WELLS, SURGEON DENTIST: A NOVEL, designed by Barbara Neely Bourgoyne and published by Acre Books, May 2018.
    • The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist
      This video serves as a book trailer for my novel, The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist. The film was shot and edited by David Grossbach. The script and narration are mine. (I also served as camera and prop assistant)
    • Wells excerpt
      In this excerpt from The Strange and True Tale of Horace Wells, Surgeon Dentist, the main character has his tooth pulled while on nitrous oxide, the first instance of painless surgery in human history. "Thus does the map of the known world widen and its mysteries multiply."