Tallent's short stories have been published in literary magazines and journals such as The New Yorker, Esquire, Harper's Magazine, The Threepenny Review, and North American Review, and her stories have been reprinted in the O. Henry Prize Stories, Best American Short Stories, and Pushcart Prize collections.

She has taught literature and creative writing at the University of California, Irvine, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the University of California, Davis. She has been a faculty member at Stanford University since 1994.

Novels

• Museum Pieces (1985)

Short Stories

• In Constant Flight (1983)
• Time With Children (1987)
• Honey (1993).

Literary Criticism

• Married Men and Magic Tricks: John Updike's Erotic Heroes (1982), a work of literary criticism.