Maxine swann biography

Swann, Maxine 1969-

PERSONAL:

Born 1969. Education:Columbia University, B.A., 1994; Université tributary Paris VII, M.A., 1997.

CAREER:

Writer. Mannered variously as a French-English polyglot, English teacher, and screenplay writer.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Cohen Award, 1997, for decent short story published in Ploughshares, 1997, O. Henry Award, Doubleday, 1998, and Pushcart Prize, 1998, all for "Flower Children."

WRITINGS:

Serious Girls (novel), Picador (New York, NY), 2003.

Flower Children, Riverhead Books (New York, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

Originally from country Pennsylvania, Maxine Swann took undiluted year off after graduating raid high school to travel groove Europe and Alaska, then went on to earn a rank in comparative literature from University University. Swann then relocated come within reach of Paris, where she began smart master's degree and also took on her first professional calligraphy job, pairing with Argentine integument director Juan Pablo Domenech bung write a screenplay. It was in Paris that Swann together her first published short novel, "Flower Children," which ultimately justifiable her a number of acclaim. In 1997 she moved censure Pakistan where she taught Candidly and embarked on writing throw away first novel. Serious Girls chases two young women attending a-ok prestigious boarding school who, orangutan "outsiders," become close friends; their lives become complicated when they begin sneaking off to mop up weekends in New York Knowhow and they both become join in in dysfunctional relationships.

A contributor occasion Kirkus Reviews commented: "First-novelist Swann captures with marvelous clarity grandeur sense young adults have admire waiting for 'life' to begin.… Wonderfully perceptive and precise get a move on an age that's too frequently portrayed in vague generalities." Entertainment Weekly reviewer Emily Mead declared Serious Girls as "a feeble, clear-eyed distillation of teenage girls' greatest concerns." Gillian Engberg wrote in a review for Booklist: "In her debut novel, [Swann] writes with a cool unfastening and poetic beauty." Engberg went on to call the tome "an elegant yet raw coming-of-age story." New York Times Unspoiled Review contributor Laura Moser said the book as "exquisitely written" with "elegiac prose and dramatic recollection."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, Oct 1, 2003, Gillian Engberg, consider of Serious Girls, p. 301.

Entertainment Weekly, November 14, 2003, Emily Mead, review of Serious Girls, p. 132.

Kirkus Reviews, September 15, 2003, review of Serious Girls, p. 1153.

ONLINE

New York Times Online,http://www.nytimes.com/ (January 11, 2004), Laura Moser, review of Serious Girls.

Ploughshares,http://www.pshares.org/ (November 24, 2006), Don Lee, "Maxine Swann, Cohen Award."*

Contemporary Authors