Ron Rash

Ron Rash grew up in Boiling Springs, North Carolina, and received a B.A. In English at Gardner-Webb College and an M.A. in English from Clemson University. He is the author of the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Finalist and New York Times bestselling novel Serena, in addition to five other novels, One Foot in Eden, Saints at the River, The World Made Straight, Above the Waterfall, and The Risen; five collections of poems; and six collections of stories, among them Burning Bright, which won the 2010 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, Chemistry and Other Stories, which was a finalist for the 2007 PEN/Faulkner Award, and most recently, Something Rich and Strange. He has twice been a recipient of the O. Henry Prize. He has taught two years of high school, seventeen years at a two-year community college and the last thirteen years at Western Carolina University.

Photograph credit: Ashley Jones