Patton, the sister of Southern Pines resident Deirdre Newton, came to writing her own stories after teaching writing in the English Department at San Francisco State University for 14 years.
Born in England, she moved to Scotland, where, at eight, she vowed to become a writer. At 12, she moved with her family to North Carolina. She followed a bachelor’s degree in English from Duke University with a master’s degree from San Francisco State several years later.
By then she, her pediatrician husband Gray, and three daughters had settled in California. Her vow to write was postponed many decades, but a college textbook, "Writing Logically, Thinking Critically," launched her career.
The same 14 writers represented here came together earlier for “The Subject of Our Lives,” which addressed important moments in the past.
This new volume picks up where the first left off, telling readers more about the good and bad that has happened in their lives.
St. Andrews Writers’ Forum
Kokoris
Jim Kokoris, author of “The Rich Part of Life,” will be featured at the Writers’ Forum Thursday, April 15 at 8 p.m. in Pate Lounge on the St. Andrews Presbyterian College campus in Laurinburg.
A graduate of the University of Illinois, Kokoris won the Friends of American Writers Award for Best First Novel of 2001 for “The Rich Part of Life.” The work recently had its film rights picked up by Columbia Pictures with James Mangold scheduled to direct. St. Martin’s Press recently published his second novel, “Sister North.”
A humorist by nature, he’s had pieces appear in the Chicago Tribune, USA Weekend, the Chicago Sun-Times, and Reader’s Digest.
Kokoris lives in the Chicago area with his wife, Anne, and their three sons.
Wojtasik
On Thursday, April 22, award-winning novelist Ted Wojtasik will read at 8 p.m. in Pate Lounge.
His first novel, “No Strange Fire,” based on Amish barn fires in Big Valley Pennsylvania, received the 1997 Silver Angel Award from Excellence in Media, a gold-starred review and “Editor’s Choice 1996” in Booklist and a spot on “The Top Ten Best Books for 1996” in The State, South Carolina’s principal newspaper.
Wojtasik received honorable mention for his short story, “Scars and Frost,” in the O. Henry Festival Stories 2000, a national competition sponsored by Greensboro College. He has publilshed short stories and book reviews in The Pilot, Pembroke Magazine, New Delta Review, Simple Vows, Tight, The MacGuffin, and Cairn. He had a short story recently published in the textbook anthology “The Emergence of Man into the 21st Century.”
His new novel, “Collage,” is an experimental work about a Yugoslavian-American artist. A review in Publishers Weekly states, “Wojtasik has crafted a compelling experiment that manages to pack some emotional punches.”
Wojtasik has read at Scotia Village, the Wadesboro Book Club, and the Thursday Afternoon Book Club of Laurinburg. In 2001, he was a featured speaker at a conference on “Amish, Old Orders and the Media” at Elizabethtown College. He was also a featured reader at the Northeast Modern Language Association’s conference held in Hartford, Conn.
Wojtasik holds an MFA from Columbia University and a Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina. He is currently Chair of the Creative Writing Department at St. Andrews Presbyterian College.
The Writers’ Forum is free and open to the public.
Poetry Contest
The Writers' Workshop is holding its 16th Annual Poetry Contest. Deadline for entries is April 30. All work must be unpublished. Each poem should not exceed two pages. Up to 15 poems may be submitted. Your name, address, phone and title of work should appear on cover sheet. The entry fee is $12 per poem. All entries receive comments from the judges. Enclose self-sealing SASE for comments and winners' list, and mail to: Poetry Contest, 387 Beaucatcher Road, Asheville, NC 28805.
