Susan Tekulve

Susan Tekulve’s nonfiction, short stories and essays have appeared in journals such as Denver Quarterly, Indiana Review, The Georgia Review, Connecticut Review, and Shenandoah. Her story collection, My Mother’s War Stories, received the 2004 Winnow Press fiction prize. Author of Savage Pilgrims, a story collection (Serving House Books, 2009), she has received scholarships from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference Scholarship and teaches writing at Converse College. Please visit http://susantekulve.com to learn more about Susan's new novel, In the Garden of Stone, or to schedule a visit with your book club, class, or community.

Advance Praise and Reviews for In the Garden of Stone:

“Tekulve’s descriptions of the hard, cold, dirty coal camp life, above and below ground, are masterful … (Her) great gift is to live in the hearts of her characters … Lyrical, haunting fiction.”

—Kirkus, starred review, 2/4/13

“Beautifully written and absorbing …very much a story about place and how it affects the human character.”

—Library Journal, “Spring Pick,” 2013

“[A] beautifully written saga telling the story of successive generations of a West Virginia family living out their lives in one particular spot of earth … There is a remarkable sensitivity to the mystery of how place affects human souls. This is a writer who definitely has what it takes to make a real contribution to Southern literature.”

—Josephine Humphreys, author of Nowhere Else on Earth, judge of the 2012 South Carolina First Novel competition

“This is a beautifully sculpted novel of fully realized characters whose story will grip you from start to finish.”

–Thomas E. Kennedy, author of Falling Sideways

“There is always a quiet peace that descends when I read Susan Tekulve. These still waters, they run mighty deep.”

—Robert Olmstead, author of The Coldest Night

“This novel is so detailed and exact that I found myself absorbed. Tekulve moved me through the generations, with surprises and sadness and drama. She makes this specialized life come alive—to show people who struggle and survive … or don’t survive.”

–C. Michael Curtis, fiction editor, The Atlantic