Maid's Version (Woodrell)

Author Bio
• Birth— March 4, 1953
• Where—Springfield, Missouri, USA
• Education—B.A., University of Kansas; M.F.A.,
   Iowa Writers' Workshop
• Awards—PEN USA Award for Fiction
• Currently—lives in West Plains, Missouri


Daniel Woodrell is an American writer of nine novels and one short story collection. He was was born in Springfield, Missouri, in the southwestern corner of the state. Althought he dropped out of high school to join the Marines, he later he earned a BA from the University of Kansas and an MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop.

Most of his novels are set in the Missouri Ozark Mountains, a landscape which he knew from childhood. He has created novels based on crime, a style he termed "country noir," a phrase which has been adopted by commentators on his work. His 1999 Tomato Run won the PEN USA Award for Fiction.

In addition to finding readers for his fiction, Woodrell has had two novels adapted for films. Woodrell's second novel, Woe to Live On (1987), was adapted for the 1999 film Ride with the Devil, directed by Ang Lee.

Winter's Bone (2006) was adapted by writer and director Debra Granik for a film of the same title, released commercially in 2010 after winning two awards at the Sundance Film Festival, including the Grand Jury Prize for a dramatic film. Several critics called it one of the best films of the year and an American classic, and it received four Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture.

Woodrell lives in West Plains, Missouri—in the Ozarks—and is married to the novelist Katie Estill. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/16/1013.)