DYBEK, SHEPARD, JULAVITS, WHITEHEAD, UDALL, & OTHER TOP AUTHORS TO SPEAK AT WISCONSIN BOOK FESTIVALS GALA FRIDAY NIGHT FESTIVAL OF FICTION

Nine of today's most celebrated novelists and short story writers will read at Wisconsin's largest fiction reading on Oct. 24, 2003: the second annual Wisconsin Book Festival's gala Friday Night Festival of Fiction.

Madison- Nine of todays most celebrated novelists and short story writers will converge on the Orpheum Theatres main stage in Madison on Friday, October 24 at 7:00 p.m. for the largest fiction reading in Wisconsin: the Friday Night Festival of Fiction. The gala event is part of the second annual Wisconsin Book Festival (October 22-26 in Madison, with statewide events throughout the year). Book Festival organizers at the Wisconsin Humanities Council today announced the lineup for the Friday Night event: Act One begins with acclaimed novelist Jim Shepard, followed by bookseller favorites Margot Livesey, Pete Fromm, and Sena Jeter Naslund, and Chicago legend Stuart Dybek. Act Two features award-winning novelist Colson Whitehead, as well as heralded young writers Heidi Julavits, April Reynolds, and Brady Udall.

The Friday Night Festival of Fiction celebrates some of the most prominent and promising voices in fiction today," says Wisconsin Book Festival director Alison Jones Chaim. It is a must-see event for anyone who loves to read."

At the debut Wisconsin Book Festival in 2002, the Friday Night Festival of Fiction filled the Orpheums auditorium almost to capacity (1,700 seats). To have that large a turnout for a book event-especially a first-time event-is tremendously exciting," notes the Festivals associate director Tilney Marsh. The audience was riveted, from start to finish. Nobody left their seats except to refresh their drinks or run to the restroom."

Organizers expect a capacity crowd again at this years Friday Night Festival of Fiction, and encourage guests to arrive early. Tickets are not required for the reading, which, like all Wisconsin Book Festival events, is free and open to the public. The Orpheum Theatre is located at 216 State Street in Madison. The Orpheum Grand Lobby bar will be open for a reception after the readings.

The 2003 Wisconsin Book Festival will feature nearly 200 authors at more than 100 free literary events such as readings, book signings, panel discussions, exhibits, and workshops. A detailed schedule, author bios, a recommended reading list, and a searchable calendar for all Wisconsin Book Festival events statewide can be found online at http://www.wisconsinbookfestival.org.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

STUART DYBEK
Stuart Dybek is a poet and award-winning author of two collections of short fiction, The Coast of Chicago (1990) and Childhood and Other Neighborhoods (1995). His latest work, a novel in stories titled I Sailed with Magellan, is due in Fall 2003. Set in the stark urban landscapes of Chicagos South Side, Dybeks captivating stories are full of poignant emotion, drama, and unexpected humor. A professor of English at Western Michigan University, Dybek lives in Kalamazoo.

PETE FROMM
Pete Fromm is the author of As Cool As I Am: A Novel (Picador) and has won Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Awards for three of his earlier books, including How This All Started and Indian Creek Chronicles. He lives with his family in Great Falls, Montana.

HEIDI JULAVITS
Heidi Julavits is an editor of the critically acclaimed new magazine The Believer, and author of the novel The Effects of Living Backwards (2003). She has published fiction and nonfiction in Esquire, The Best American Short Stories 1999, Story, Zoetrope, McSweeney's, Harper's Bazaar, and Time. Her first novel, The Mineral Palace, was a Los Angeles Times Best Book, and was published in ten countries.

MARGOT LIVESEY
Margot Livesey is the award-winning author of a story collection, Learning by Heart, and several novels, including Homework, Criminals, The Missing World, and Eva Moves the Furniture. She has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. A native of the Scottish Highlands, Livesey currently resides and teaches in the Boston area.

SENA JETER NASLUND
Recipient of the Harper Lee Award, Sena Jeter Naslund is the author of the bestselling novel Ahabs Wife, or the Stargazer, which was nominated for the prestigious Orange Prize in the U.K. She is also the author of Sherlock in Love and The Disobedience of Water. The title of her new novel, Four Spirits, refers to the racist church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama, in which four young girls were killed in 1963. Naslund is a Distinguished Teaching professor at the University of Louisville.

APRIL REYNOLDS
April Reynolds teaches philosophy and creative writing at New York University and lives in New York City. Knee Deep in Wonder, her first novel, received a Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation Award for unpublished work.

JIM SHEPARD
Jim Shepard is the author of six novels, including Nosferatu and the forthcoming Project X, and two collections of short stories: Batting Against Castro and the forthcoming Love and Hydrogen. His stories appear in The New Yorker, Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, The Paris Review, TriQuarterly, and Tin House, and were praised by The New York Times Book Review for being so imaginative and mysterious and [having] such distinctive voices that they seem certain to take up permanent residence in a readers memory." Shepard teaches at Williams College and in the Warren Wilson MFA program.

BRADY UDALL
Brady Udall is the author of the acclaimed novel The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint and the widely praised collection Letting Lose the Hounds, which features stories that are funny and dark and populated by the most downtrodden and affecting group of outcasts since Denis Johnsons Jesus' Son" (New York Times Book Review). Born and raised in the Indian Country of northeastern Arizona, Udall is a graduate of the Iowa Writers Workshop, a James Michener Fellow, and a winner of the Playboy fiction contest. His stories have been published in GQ, Story, and The Paris Review. He lives in Illinois.

COLSON WHITEHEAD
Colson Whiteheads first novel, The Intuitionist, won the New Voices Award and was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award. His other novel, John Henry Days, won The New York Times Editors Choice Award and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Pulitzer Prize. His nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, The Village Voice, Salon, and Newsday. He is the recipient of a Whiting Award and a MacArthur Fellowship. His most recent book is the nonfiction work, The Colossus of New York: A City in Thirteen Parts (October 2003).

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