Amy Hempel is an American short story writer and journalist. She teaches creative writing at the Michener Center for Writers and is also a university professor at Brooklyn College.

Hempel was a former student of Gordon Lish, who eventually helped her publish her first collection of short stories. Her work has been published in Harper's, Vanity Fair, GQ, and Bomb.

She is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, as well as the Ambassador Book Award in 2007, the Rea Award for the Short Story in 2008, and the PEN/Malamud Award for Short Fiction in 2009.