John Vanderslice
My blogs
Blogs I follow
| Industry | Education |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Writing Professor |
| Introduction | I've transplanted from the Middle Atlantic states, where I grew up and which I still love, to the south. I spent four years in Louisiana earning my doctorate and have begun my twelfth year in Arkansas. I'm a college teacher, maybe a cliched profession for a writer, but it suits me. I get to think and talk about what I care about most. I've published over forty short stories in my career, but in recent years I've been working hard on novels. One, called Burnt Norway, I've published on Lulu.com. Another is the Van Gogh novel about which I'm blogging. Last fall (2009) I enjoyed a sabbatical in which I made great progress on the book. But I'm hardly out of the woods yet, and a new semester of full-time teaching duties is upon me. Even so, I enjoy the academic life; I enjoy my hometown; and I love my family. But maybe there's no finer pleasure than writing fiction. Please feel free to contact me about anything. My email: johnv@uca.edu |
| Interests | Long distance running (8 time marathoner), cooking, wine, reading, enjoying the company of my wife and two children, recreational hikes and climbs, keeping up on Arkansas sports. |
| Favorite movies | Gosh, I'm just not a movie buff. And it's hard to get the time to sneak off to a movie with my wife and without the kids. I can tell you what Disney / Pixar / Dreamworks movies I've liked most, but I don't thinks that's of much interest to anyone. |
| Favorite music | I used to listen to a great deal of Prog Rock. (You know, those Yes albums with songs that lasted for a whole side.) Today if I'm listening to music it's likely to be folk or jazz (including jazz vocalists) or classical. |
| Favorite books | Too many, really, to list. But some of my old faves are The Scarlet Letter and Blithesdale Romance by Hawthorne, To Whom the Bell Tolls, and All the King's Men. Contemporary writers I like include Peter Carey, Richard Russo, Lorrie Morre, Charles Baxter, George Saunders, and Dave Eggers. |