Members of Northwestern Oklahoma State University’s English, Foreign Language and Humanities Department will play host to the next Visiting Writer’s Series on Wednesday, March 23, at 7 p.m. in the Vinson Hall Alabaster Room.
The event is free and open to the public.
Special guest Marcia Kay Preston, writing as M.K. Preston, will read from recent works and discuss the changing face of publishing.
Preston is the author of an Oklahoma mystery series featuring Chantalene Morrell, daughter of a Gypsy mother and a redneck father. Her novel, “Song of the Bones,” (2003) won the 2004 Mary Higgins Clark Award for suspense fiction, and also the 2004 Oklahoma Book Award in fiction. The first book in the series, “Perhaps She’ll Die,” (2001) was nominated for the 2002 Mary Higgins Clark Award, and for Macavity and Barry awards in the Best First Mystery division.
Preston earned degrees from University of Central Oklahoma, taught in public high schools for more than a decade, and worked for a time as public relations and publications director for the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City.
As a magazine writer for many years, she also edited and published “ByLine,” a trade magazine for aspiring writers.
Preston lives beside a creek in central Oklahoma, where she gardens and dodges tornadoes.
Her most recent novels are general fiction. “The Butterfly House,” under the byline Marcia Preston, hit No. 1 on the HeatSeekers hit of debut fiction in the United Kingdom. Other writing pieces include: “The Piano Man” (2006), about the emotional and psychological results of a heart transplant; “Trudy’s Promise,” the story of a young mother’s fight to regain her son when they are separated by the Berlin Wall; and “The Wind Comes Sweeping,” set on a wind farm and cattle ranch in Oklahoma.
The Visiting Writer’s Series is a way to bring Oklahoma Writers to northwest Oklahoma every spring to discuss writing, the publishing industry and to share their work.
For more information contact Dr. Kathryn Lane, department chair and assistant professor of English, at (580) 327-8470 or kelane@nwosu.edu.