The WVU Press and the Department of English Creative Writing program will host author Mo Daviau and alum Kanza Javed for a joint campus event at 7:30 p.m. Monday (Oct. 13) in Colson Hall, Room 130.
Daviau’s novel "Epic and Lovely," published by WVU Press, features a protagonist who returns to her hometown of Los Angeles to spend her final days with The Friends of the Good Thumb, a support group for patients with A12 fibrillin deficiency syndrome. This genetic disorder affects children of much-older fathers, causing several physical deformities and death around the age of 40.
A bookseller and event host at Annie Bloom’s Books in Portland, Oregon, Daviau's first novel "Every Anxious Wave" was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award.
Javed’s “What Remains After a Fire,” a collection of stories published by Norton, depicts characters on the margins of society who hope to forge better lives. Her protagonists include a Pakistani student in a small Appalachian town, a nurse enlisted in a mission to trap a ghost, and a lonely wife who becomes obsessed with a worry doll.
Javed earned her master's degree in creative writing from WVU, where she won the Rebecca Mason Perry Award, given to outstanding graduate students.
“We’re honored to have two amazing writers come to campus to read from their compelling new books,” said Mark Brazaitis, professor of English and the director of the Creative Writing Program. “It will be a wonderful event.”