APPLETON, WIS. — Award-winning novelist Jane Hamilton will read excerpts from her latest book “When Madeline Was Young” Thursday, January 11 at Lawrence University. The reading, at 7:30 p.m. in Harper Hall in the Lawrence Music-Drama Center, 420 E. College Ave., Appleton, is free and open to the public. Hamilton will conduct a book signing following the reading.
Published by Doubleday in September, 2006, “When Madeline Was Young,” weaves a richly-textured story of a tragic accident and the profound effect human kindness has on two generations of a family. Hamilton’s fifth novel, the Washington Post hailed it as her “most distinguished work so far, a story in which tragedy is balanced brilliantly against the consolations and pleasures of ordinary life.”
Hamilton, 49, received the 1989 PEN/Hemingway Award for her first novel, “The Book of Ruth.” Her second novel, “A Map of the World,” published in 1994, was named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times and was included on the top 10 books of the year by Entertainment Weekly, Publishers Weekly, the Miami Herald and People magazine.
Her third book, “The Short Story of a Prince,” received the Chicago Tribune’s 1998 Heartland Prize, an award that reinforces and perpetuates the values of heartland America and earned a Best Book citation from Publishers Weekly. In 2000, Hamilton released her fourth novel, “Disobedience,” which joined “The Book of Ruth” and “A Map of the World” as a best-seller after all three were named to Oprah Winfrey’s book club.
The daughter and granddaughter of writers, Hamilton was born in Oak Park, Ill., and today makes her home in Rochester, Wis. She earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Carleton College and spent time after graduation working at an apple orchard in Wisconsin before pursuing a writing career in 1982.
Hamilton’s appearance is sponsored by the Gordon R. Clapp Lectureship in American Studies.
