Jayne Anne Phillips, born and raised in West Virginia, is the author of four previous novels, Lark and Termite, MotherKind, Shelter, and Machine Dreams, and two widely anthologised collections of stories, Fast Lanes and Black Tickets. Lark and Termite, winner of the Heartland Prize, was a Finalist for the 2009 National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Prix de Medicis tranger. Phillips is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, a Bunting Fellowship, the Sue Kaufman Prize and an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. She is the Distinguished Professor of English and Director of the MFA Programme at Rugters-Newark, the State University of New Jersey. She divides her time between Boston, New York and New Jersey. www.jayneannephillips.com