Lynda Rutledge
Lynda Rutledge is the bestselling author of "West with Giraffes," selected by Library of Congress-affiliated Texas Center for the Book as their 2023 Great Read and translated into 15 languages. She’s also the author of "Faith Bass Darling's Last Garage Sale," winner of the 2013 Writers League of Texas Fiction Award which was adapted into the major 2019 French film "La deniére folie de Claire Darling" starring Catherine Deneuve. Her fiction has won awards and residencies from Atlantic Center for the Arts, Illinois Arts Council, and Ragdale Foundation, among many others.
Her latest novel, "Mockingbird Summer," set in a tiny segregated town in 1964 on the eve of massive cultural change, explores the impact of great books, the burden of potential, and the power of friendship with humor, poignancy, and hope.
In her eclectic career before becoming a novelist, she was a full-time professional writer––a freelance journalist, copywriter, film reviewer, book collaborator, and travel writer while also earning an MA in American literature and an MFA in creative writing,
After years residing in urban locales including Chicago and San Diego, she currently lives with her husband outside Austin, Texas. For much more information about all her books as well as Lynda, visit her website: www.lyndarutledge.com
“You can know all about a person from the things they collect, the books on their shelves, the chairs in their parlor. … Let me into your house; I could write your life story.”
“We're just like the antiques. We grow old and get scarred and beat up along the way, and the only question becomes whether we're going to make it until we realize what we already have is valuable." --Faith Bass Darling's Last Garage Sale”
“See, what you do here is you work yourself away from the words, slowly shedding them until there's no more need of them, because you're them and they're you- wordless words. And then, what you want, all you want, are the slow silent white fireworks of Who-What Made It All, calling it whatever you want to until you don't call it anything at all because you don't need to, you just don't need to anymore...”