He holds a PhD from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and prior to that spent three years working on expedition cruise ships that traveled the world. His work has appeared in numerous American Journals such as The Missouri Review, Glimmer Train, Michigan Quarterly Review, Shenandoah, and Cimarron Review as well as over thirty other literary journals and anthologies. Murphy received several writing awards for his work. Among others he won The Atlantic’s 2009 and 2010 Student Writing Contests and his short story collection has been among the finalists for the Iowa Short Fiction Book Award.