Native St. Louis fiction writer John Dalton to read Jan. 27

Fiction writer and St. Louis native John Dalton will open Washington University’s Writing Program Spring Reading Series at 8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 27.

The reading is free and open to the public and will take place in Hurst Lounge, Room 201, Duncker Hall, on the university’s Hilltop Campus. A book-signing and reception will follow and copies of Dalton’s works will be available for purchase. Duncker Hall is located at the northwest corner of Brookings Quadrangle, near the intersection of Brookings and Hoyt drives. For more information, call (314) 935-7130.

Dalton’s first novel, Heaven Lake, was published by Scribner in 2004 (the Scribner paperback will appear in April 2005) and chosen by Barnes & Noble for their Discover Great New Writers program. His short fiction has appeared in Story, Alaska Quarterly Review and other journals. Honors include a James Michener Award as well as first and second year fellowships at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Mass.

“It isn’t often that you read a first novel (any novel, for that matter, but especially a first novel) with the combination of grand proportions to the narrative and page to page restraint that John Dalton’s Heaven Lake has,” says Marshall Klimasewiski, assistant professor of English and fiction writer on the faculty of The Writing Program, both in Arts & Sciences.

“It’s one of those books in which you find yourself looking back from the late chapters, as if across the breadth of a long (and not always pleasant) journey, with a sense of reticence and nostalgia, having come so far. I think it’s a beautiful debut, and I can’t wait to read this author’s next book.”

Dalton is a graduate of the University of Missouri, St. Louis, and the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop. He is currently visiting assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.