A Writer's outing

Earlier this month, I ventured out to check out a writer's group that meets monthly in Salem.

The speaker was a former professor of mine from Hollins, someone I'd not seen in many years. Professor Marilyn Moriarty spoke about her efforts to locate information about her mother's years in World War II and where her search had taken her. Her memoir, Slivered Shadows: Recovering a French Résistante, will be published in August 2026. 

This was the first time I'd been to this group, but I don't think it will be the last.

Dan Smith, group founder

The group on the other side.

Another one of my Hollins professors, on the left.

Professor Moriarty.

Professor Moriarty reads from her upcoming book.

From the Hollins.edu website:

Marilyn Moriarty received her doctorate from the University of California, Irvine, with a dissertation on Shakespeare and a second emphasis in literary theory. She compiled the text of two Shakespeare plays for drama anthologies and co-edited a collection of essays on postmodern architecture. She is the author of Writing Science through Critical Thinking, a scientific writing textbook, and Moses Unchained, which won the Associated Writing Programs Creative Nonfiction Award. Her essays have been published in The Antioch Review, The Chattahoochee Review, Creative Nonfiction, The Kenyon Review, Raritan, River Teeth, and others. Three have been named “Notable” by editors of the Best American Essays series.

She won the 2014 Faulkner-Wisdom Gold Medal for the essay. Her stories have won the Katherine Anne Porter Prize, the Peregrine Prize for fiction, and the University of Utah novella contest. Her essay “Bone Lab” was anthologized in the 2024 Best Spiritual Literature.