Evidence of Things Unseen (Wiggins)

Author Bio
• Birth—September 8, 1947
• Where—Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA
• Education—Manheim Township High School, Lancaster
• Awards—Whiting Award, 1989; Janet Heidiger Kafka Prize
   for best novel written by an American woman, 1990
• Currently—lives in Los Angeles, California


Marianne Wiggins was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and has lived in Brussels, Rome, Paris, and London. She is the author of ten books of fiction, including John Dollar and Evidence of Things Unseen, for which she was a National Book Award finalist in fiction, as well as a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. She has won an NEA grant, the Whiting Writers' Award, and the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize. She is Professor of English at the University of Southern California. (From the publisher.)

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From a 2005 Barnes & Noble interview:

Q: What was the book that most influenced your life or your career as a writer—and why?

A: Hands down, this was Tillie Olsen's Silences. It was published soon after I turned 30, when I had one book in print and had not really found my canvas nor my voice. I was at a turning point in my life, not knowing if I could make a "career" of writing and having a young daughter to support on my own. Olsen's masterpiece is not so much "written" as gasped — her passionate engagement with the subject of women writers grips you physically like a madwoman on a bus demanding your participation in her cause. I read it in the kitchen, I read it in bed — I still read parts of it at least once every month.

Q: What are your favorite books, and what makes them special to you?

A: When I moved back to the United States after living 16 years in London, I had to ship all my possessions to California through the Panama Canal. I'll always remember the look on that Allied Movers agent's face when he saw my shelves of books: over 300 cartons' worth, and that was after I weeded out the out-of-date travel books to places like Burma and Romania that I had bought for research for my novels. I'm going to have to sidestep this question, adapting my sister's line. She has five children and frequently, sincerely, says, "I love ‘em all." (Bio and interview from Barnes & Noble.)