Michael Thomas, award-winning author of “Man Gone Down,” a New York Times Notable Book, will present a free public fiction reading at 8 p.m. today in room 109, Grubbs Hall, Pittsburg State University.
His reading is being sponsored by the PSU Distinguished Visiting Writer Series and Student Fee Council. A reception will follow the reading.
In June Thomas received the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, one of the most lucrative literary prizes in the world. “Man Gone Down” was selected from 145 books nominated by libraries around the globe, only four of them from the United States.
According to the New York Times, the IMPAC Dublin Award is often described as “the largest and most international literary prize in the world after the Nobel.”
In a “Booklist” starred review, Donna Seaman called the novel “a rhapsodic and piercing post-9/11 lament over aggression, greed, and racism, and a ravishing blues for the soul’s unending loneliness.”
In an excerpt from “Man Gone Down,” Thomas writes of 9/11: “C’s on his bunk, looking out the window. I see his face. He’s a child, then he’s not, at least not in his face: It’s wiped clean — no chocolate, no jam smears, no innocence. Then the child returns, which is worse, because that face can’t absorb the horror of the fire across the river.”
“I am thrilled we were able to get internationally recognized author Michael Thomas to come read here,” said Karen Stolz, PSU assistant professor of creative writing and literature and herself a published novelist. “Our creative writing students are really looking forward to this event.”
Thomas received a master of fine arts from Warren Wilson College, and is currently a full-time English professor at Hunter College, Manhattan, N.Y.
PITTSBURG —
