Dutton was born in 1975 and raised in California. She graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz with a BA in History in 1997. She later studied writing at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, receiving her MFA in 2002. In 2007, she earned a hybrid Ph.D. in English and Creative Writing from the University of Denver, where she also served as Associate Editor for the Denver Quarterly. Dutton is the author of Attempts at a Life (Tarpaulin Sky Press, 2007) and S P R A W L (Siglio, 2010). Her writing has appeared in magazines such as Harper's, BOMB, The Brooklyn Rail, NOON, Fence, 3rd bed, jubilat, and Octopus, and anthologies including A Best of Fence and Where We Live Now: An Annotated Reader.
She teaches fiction and literature classes in the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University. She is also a book designer at Dalkey Archive Press.
Dutton recently launched the independent press Dorothy, a publishing project. The website states that Dorothy, a publishing project is dedicated "to works of fiction, or near fiction, or about fiction, mostly by women."