ISSUED: 4 May 2021
MEDIA CONTACT: Valerie Owens
SHEPHERDSTOWN, WV — Shepherd University’s “Anthology of Appalachian Writers, Volume XIII, Dorothy Allison” is now available. The book centers around the themes, ideas, and work of Dorothy Allison, who was the One Book One West Virginia author for 2020 and the 22nd Appalachian Heritage Writer-in-Residence at Shepherd University.
Published by the Shepherd University Center for Appalachian Studies and Communities and the West Virginia Center for the Book, the volume features writers from across the country, including Allison along with the poet laureates of Ohio and West Virginia, several Weatherford Award winners, and award-winning poets, essayists, short story writers, and photographers.
Also in the book are winners of the West Virginia Fiction Competition sponsored by the West Virginia Center for the Book and West Virginia Library Commission. These include Jordan Carter’s “June Drop,” Cat Pleska’s “Killing Time,” Pat Donohoe’s “Closet Wars,” and Caroline Higginbottom’s “Side with Me,” the Judge’s Choice winner from public school submissions.
Poets Marc Harshman, Darnell Arnoult, Pauletta Hansel, Kari Gunter-Seymour, and E. J. Wade have selections in the volume. Prose writers Karen Spears Zacharias, Kathleen Furbee, and Lois Spencer are in the book as well. Editors of the book include Natalie Sypolt, Dave Hoffman, and Aneyla Dozier, an English education major from Martinsburg, who have constructed both an entertaining and moving collection that contributes to ideas about “othering,” stereotyping, and the kinds of class and gender topics that inform the writing of Dorothy Allison.
The Shepherd University Foundation and the West Virginia Humanities Council were instrumental in bringing this book to the public. The book can be purchased at Four Seasons Books in Shepherdstown, Tamarack, and other venues across the region.
For information about the Appalachian Studies Program at Shepherd, with its new interdisciplinary B.A./B.S. undergraduate degree or Celtic Roots Global Appalachia program, contact Dr. Sylvia Bailey Shurbutt at sshurbut@shepherd.edu.
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