Bobbie Ann Mason

Bobbie Ann Mason is an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and literary critic born in Mayfield, Kentucky, renowned for her vivid portrayals of working-class life in rural western Kentucky. Her breakthrough collection Shiloh and Other Stories (1982) won the PEN/Hemingway Award, and her novel In Country (1985), about a teenager grappling with her father's death in Vietnam, was adapted into a film starring Bruce Willis. She holds degrees from the University of Kentucky, SUNY Binghamton, and the University of Connecticut, and her memoir Clear Springs (1999) was a Pulitzer Prize finalist.