Mary McGarry Morris
Encyclopedia
Mary McGarry Morris is an American novelist, short story author and playwright
. In 1991, Michiko Kakutani
of The New York Times
described Mary McGarry Morris as "one of the most skillful new writers at work in America today" http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE3DE1430F937A35752C0A967958260&scp=9&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt; The Washington Post
has described her as a "superb storyteller" http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A30380-2004Mar4¬Found=true; and The Miami Herald
has called her "one of our finest American writers. http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Lost-Mother/Mary-McGarry-McGarry-Morris/e/9780143036456" She has been most often compared to John Steinbeck
and Carson McCullers
. Although her writing style is different, she also has been compared to William Faulkner
for her character-driven storytelling. A finalist for the National Book Award
http://www.nationalbook.org/nba1988.html and PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
http://www.penfaulkner.org/affWinners01.htm and best-selling author, Morris has published six (6) novels and numerous short stories and has written a play about the insanity trial of Mary Todd Lincoln
.
http://www.nationalbook.org/nba1988.html and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
http://www.penfaulkner.org/affWinners01.htm.
Her 1991 novel, A Dangerous Woman, was named by Time Magazine as one of the Five Best Novels of the Year http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,974599,00.html and as one of the best books of the year by American Library Association
(ALA) Library Journal
. As a result of A Dangerous Woman, Morris won the Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award. http://www.barnesandnoble.com/awards/index.asp?PID=17970& The novel also was the basis for a 1993 movie of the same name
which starred among others Debra Winger
, Gabriel Byrne
, David Strathairn
, Barbara Hershey
, Maggie Gyllenhaal
and Jake Gyllenhaal
.
Her 1995 novel (her third) Songs in Ordinary Time
, sold one and one-half million copies; was a New York Times Bestseller; was a selection of Oprah's Book Club
http://www2.oprah.com/obc/pastbooks/mary_morris/obc_pb_19970618.jhtml; and was made into a CBS
made for television movie starring Sissy Spacek
and Beau Bridges
.
Her 2000 novel, her fourth, Fiona Range was published to critical acclaim. A reviewer for The New York Times Book Review
stated about Morris' writing: "She can bring the ordinary to life with the sheer clarity of vision. She knows how a house with children in it sounds at night, what the heat and bustle in a kitchen feel like before a family dinner and how indiscretions arise in a dining room when everyone is flushed with wine."
Morris' fifth novel, published in 2004 was entitled A Hole in the Universe and tells the story of what happens when a man returns to his community after serving 25 years in prison for murder. The Washington Post wrote the following: "Morris is a master at sympathetic portraits of those clinging to the peripheries of society. And nowhere is her talent more evident than in her extraordinary new novel, A Hole in the Universe. Morris [is] a superb storyteller...and [her] undeniable compassion for and intuitive understanding of her characters' lives make us know and care about these people, too."
Her sixth novel, The Lost Mother was published in 2005 and from the perspective of a 12 year old boy tells the story of what happens when the boy's mother leaves him, his sister and his father in the midst of the Great Depression. The Boston Globe
described the book as "wonderful and absorbing" while The Washington Post
wrote "The Lost Mother is the quietest, subtlest novel that ever kept me up into the small hours of the night, unable to look away."
Mary McGarry Morris stated the following about The Lost Mother:
“Astonishing… Morris’s book should be judged on its own merits, and against the work of our most highly practiced and accomplished novelists.” Vogue
"A dazzling first novel… Events are presented with such authority that they hum with both the authenticity of real life and the mythic power of fable. This is a startling and powerful debut” Michiko Kakutani
, The New York Times
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEFDF1231F937A35755C0A96E948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1
A Dangerous Woman
“At once deeply thrilling and deeply affecting...should burnish Ms. Morris’s reputation as one of the most skillful new writers at work in America today.” The New York Times
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE3DE1430F937A35752C0A967958260&scp=15&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"Brilliantly acute ...Remarkable ... Morris' magnanimous ability to portray her characters with so much tenderness and cruelty may be her novel's finest strength." Boston Sunday Globe
Songs In Ordinary Time
“A gritty, beautifully crafted novel rich in wisdom and suspense ... Secures Morris’s status as one of our finest American writers.”
The Miami Herald
"Morris seems merely to have been sharpening her skills when she wrote Vanished ... and A Dangerous Woman. Now she has brought all her gifts to bear on Songs of Ordinary Time. The flowing sentences and scenes make every page worth reading." The Philadelphia Inquirer
Fiona Range
“Morris is a master storyteller, an acute observer of small-town America and of people who struggle, sometimes in vain, to have lives that amount to more than hard work and a cold bed… Fiona Range, the novel, is a wealth of passion and heartbreak.” USA Today
“While Morris’ earlier work has often been compared to Steinbeck and McCullers, here she seems unmistakably under the spell of the Bronte sisters ... Morris grounds her storytelling with compelling characterizations and masterful plotting.” New York Newsday
A Hole in the Universe
"Welcome to the world of Mary McGarry Morris — and what a world it is. Richly atmospheric, bristling with dialogue, so tightened with suspense it threatens to snap. Morris is a master at sympathetic portraits of those clinging to the peripheries of society. And nowhere is her talent more evident than in her extraordinary new novel, A Hole in the Universe. Morris [is] a superb storyteller ... and [her] undeniable compassion for and intuitive understanding of her characters' lives make us know and care about these people, too." Washington Post
The Lost Mother
“Never one to shy away from the messy and bleak, Morris unflinchingly illuminates the bitter existence of neglected children and their inspiring resilience, once again proving herself a storyteller of great compassion, insight, and depth.” Publishers Weekly
“The Lost Mother paints a nuanced portrait of small-town life ... Morris’s characters are finely drawn, her dialogue rings true, and the epic sweep of her storytelling draws apt comparison to Dickens and Steinbeck.” The Orlando Sentinel
; was raised in Rutland, Vermont
and currently resides in Andover, Massachusetts
. She married Michael W. Morris and lives with him in Massachusetts. Her husband is a partner in the law firm Morris, Rossi & Hayes in Andover, Massachusetts
. She and her husband had 5 children and, as a result, Morris spent many years writing late at night after her children went to bed. For many years before she was published, Morris did not share with her friends and extended family members that she was writing novels. Her first novel Vanished created a sensation not only for its award nominations, but also for the fact that few in literary circles and in her hometown knew she was a writer. Before she was able to dedicate herself entirely to writing, Morris worked as a social worker for the Massachusetts
Department of Public Welfare in Lawrence, Massachusetts
. Not surprisingly given her upbringing and her residence in Andover, Massachusetts, a number of her novels are set in fictional towns in Vermont while parts of Vanished, A Hole in the Universe and The Lost Mother are likewise set in Massachusetts. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
Mary McGarry Morris is not related to the author named "Mary Morris," but may be a distant relative of award-winning writer Jean McGarry
. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A02E3D71139F934A35753C1A9619C8B63&scp=1&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6516157.html?q=mary+mcgarry+morris
"I suppose I am concerned with what my characters are looking for. I am concerned with their yearning -- the constant yearning of the human heart. That is what I feel when I am writing. And what I question." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"There are countless Aubrey Wallaces in this world - little people, pale lives, the briefest, simplest human creatures. They are the shadows in early morning doorways and the solitary late night climbing of wooden stairs. They wash dishes in restaurants and mop floors and pick up litter in the park, and they are always startled to be spoken to, because no one ever does." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"All parenting requires sacrifice, especially motherhood. Because love is the giving over of one's self to another, there must be sacrifice or else the love is depthless and self-serving." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"Sometimes, charity is far easier given to a stranger on a dark night than to a pauper at our own table." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/fiona_range.html
"I'm often as amused as bewildered to hear characters from my previous novels described as "on the fringe" or "somewhat unusual." It is always surprising to be asked if I know "people like that." Of course I do; we all do. I see them as aspects of all of us." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"I am not part of any literary world. And I have no desire to move into a literary world. I am wary of letting an aura take the place of the effort of writing." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"By its very nature and in its healthiest aspects, the child-parent relationship entails discordance, conflict, struggle. I don't think it is ever possible to love a child too much. Often, however, the worst parenting is done in the name of love. And that can run the gamut from excessive permissiveness to abuse." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"I begin with pen and paper. The first draft is written in longhand, with a very real, almost organic sensation of flow from the inside out. In the beginning, strong characters are more important than having a complete plot in mind. For me the story is always contained in the characters." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/a_hole_in_the_universe.html
"Born in Connecticut, raised in Vermont, and for most of my years now a Massachusetts resident living close by the New Hampshire border, I am certainly a New Englander." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/fiona_range.html
"The core of my life is writing. Without that, I'd be pretty miserable." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
. In 1991, Michiko Kakutani
Michiko Kakutani
is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning critic for The New York Times and is considered by many to be a leading literary critic in the United States.-Life and career:...
of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
described Mary McGarry Morris as "one of the most skillful new writers at work in America today" http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE3DE1430F937A35752C0A967958260&scp=9&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt; The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
has described her as a "superb storyteller" http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A30380-2004Mar4¬Found=true; and The Miami Herald
The Miami Herald
The Miami Herald is a daily newspaper owned by The McClatchy Company headquartered on Biscayne Bay in the Omni district of Downtown Miami, Florida, United States...
has called her "one of our finest American writers. http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Lost-Mother/Mary-McGarry-McGarry-Morris/e/9780143036456" She has been most often compared to John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...
and Carson McCullers
Carson McCullers
Carson McCullers was an American writer. She wrote novels, short stories, and two plays, as well as essays and some poetry. Her first novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter explores the spiritual isolation of misfits and outcasts of the South...
. Although her writing style is different, she also has been compared to William Faulkner
William Faulkner
William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...
for her character-driven storytelling. A finalist for the National Book Award
National Book Award
The National Book Awards are a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the current year. In 1989 the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization which now oversees and manages the National Book...
http://www.nationalbook.org/nba1988.html and PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction is awarded annually by the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to the authors of the year's best works of fiction by living American citizens. The winner receives US $15,000 and each of four runners-up receives US $5000. The foundation brings the winner and runners-up to...
http://www.penfaulkner.org/affWinners01.htm and best-selling author, Morris has published six (6) novels and numerous short stories and has written a play about the insanity trial of Mary Todd Lincoln
Mary Todd Lincoln
Mary Ann Lincoln was the wife of the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, and was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865.-Life before the White House:...
.
Published novels
Her first novel, Vanished, was written over ten-year period with only her husband and children aware of her writing effort. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt It was rejected by numerous publishers and agents before an agent, Jean Naggar, helped her sell it to Viking Press. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt It was published in 1988 to favorable reviews and was a finalist for the National Book AwardNational Book Award
The National Book Awards are a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the current year. In 1989 the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization which now oversees and manages the National Book...
http://www.nationalbook.org/nba1988.html and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction is awarded annually by the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to the authors of the year's best works of fiction by living American citizens. The winner receives US $15,000 and each of four runners-up receives US $5000. The foundation brings the winner and runners-up to...
http://www.penfaulkner.org/affWinners01.htm.
Her 1991 novel, A Dangerous Woman, was named by Time Magazine as one of the Five Best Novels of the Year http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,974599,00.html and as one of the best books of the year by American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
(ALA) Library Journal
Library Journal
Library Journal is a trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey . It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional practice...
. As a result of A Dangerous Woman, Morris won the Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award. http://www.barnesandnoble.com/awards/index.asp?PID=17970& The novel also was the basis for a 1993 movie of the same name
A Dangerous Woman (1993 film)
A Dangerous Woman is a 1993 film from Amblin Entertainment and Gramercy Pictures directed by Stephen Gyllenhaal and written for the screen by his then wife Naomi Foner...
which starred among others Debra Winger
Debra Winger
Mary Debra Winger is an American actress. Three-times an Oscar nominee, she received awards for acting in Terms of Endearment, for which she won the National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Actress in 1983, and in A Dangerous Woman, for which she won the Tokyo International Film Festival...
, Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel Byrne
Gabriel James Byrne is an Irish actor, film director, film producer, writer, cultural ambassador and audiobook narrator. His acting career began in the Focus Theatre before he joined Londo's Royal Court Theatre in 1979. Byrne's screen debut came in the Irish soap opera The Riordans and the...
, David Strathairn
David Strathairn
David Russell Strathairn is an American actor. He was nominated for an Academy Award for portraying journalist Edward R. Murrow in Good Night, and Good Luck...
, Barbara Hershey
Barbara Hershey
Barbara Hershey , also known as Barbara Seagull, is an American actress. In a career spanning nearly 50 years, she has played a variety of roles on television and in cinema, in several genres including westerns and comedies...
, Maggie Gyllenhaal
Maggie Gyllenhaal
Margaret Ruth "Maggie" Gyllenhaal born November 16, 1977) is an American actress. She is the daughter of director Stephen Gyllenhaal and screenwriter Naomi Foner Gyllenhaal and the older sister of actor Jake Gyllenhaal. She made her screen debut when she began to appear in her father's films...
and Jake Gyllenhaal
Jake Gyllenhaal
Jacob Benjamin "Jake" Gyllenhaal is an American actor. The son of director Stephen Gyllenhaal and screenwriter Naomi Foner, Gyllenhaal began acting at age ten...
.
Her 1995 novel (her third) Songs in Ordinary Time
Songs in Ordinary Time
Songs in Ordinary Time is the 1995 novel by Mary McGarry Morris, and was chosen as an Oprah's Book Club selection in June 1997.-Plot introduction:...
, sold one and one-half million copies; was a New York Times Bestseller; was a selection of Oprah's Book Club
Oprah's Book Club
Oprah's Book Club was a book discussion club segment of the American talk show The Oprah Winfrey Show, highlighting books chosen by host Oprah Winfrey. Winfrey started the book club in 1996, selecting a new novel for viewers to read and discuss each month. The Club ended its 15-year run, along with...
http://www2.oprah.com/obc/pastbooks/mary_morris/obc_pb_19970618.jhtml; and was made into a CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
made for television movie starring Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek
Sissy Spacek is an American actress and singer. She came to international prominence for her for role as Carrie White in Brian De Palma's 1976 horror film Carrie for which she earned her first Academy Award nomination...
and Beau Bridges
Beau Bridges
Lloyd Vernet "Beau" Bridges III is an American actor and director.- Early life :Bridges was born in Los Angeles, the son of actor Lloyd Bridges and his college sweetheart, Dorothy Bridges . He was nicknamed "Beau" by his mother and father after Ashley Wilkes's son in Gone with the Wind, the book...
.
Her 2000 novel, her fourth, Fiona Range was published to critical acclaim. A reviewer for The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
stated about Morris' writing: "She can bring the ordinary to life with the sheer clarity of vision. She knows how a house with children in it sounds at night, what the heat and bustle in a kitchen feel like before a family dinner and how indiscretions arise in a dining room when everyone is flushed with wine."
Morris' fifth novel, published in 2004 was entitled A Hole in the Universe and tells the story of what happens when a man returns to his community after serving 25 years in prison for murder. The Washington Post wrote the following: "Morris is a master at sympathetic portraits of those clinging to the peripheries of society. And nowhere is her talent more evident than in her extraordinary new novel, A Hole in the Universe. Morris [is] a superb storyteller...and [her] undeniable compassion for and intuitive understanding of her characters' lives make us know and care about these people, too."
Her sixth novel, The Lost Mother was published in 2005 and from the perspective of a 12 year old boy tells the story of what happens when the boy's mother leaves him, his sister and his father in the midst of the Great Depression. The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe
The Boston Globe is an American daily newspaper based in Boston, Massachusetts. The Boston Globe has been owned by The New York Times Company since 1993...
described the book as "wonderful and absorbing" while The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
wrote "The Lost Mother is the quietest, subtlest novel that ever kept me up into the small hours of the night, unable to look away."
Mary McGarry Morris stated the following about The Lost Mother:
"Inspiration was easy because it was during those same years that my grandmother abandoned her husband and three children. The day she left, she brought her four-year-old daughter and youngest child, my mother, to a friend's house, then, dressed in her very best clothes, my grandmother climbed into a taxi and rode away forever. The image of that little girl watching from the window as her mother deserted her would come to me whenever there was sorrow in my mother's life. Forgiving by nature, my mother tried to understand what had happened, but because she felt such love and fierce loyalty to her own children, her mother's actions remained a painful, troubling mystery. Growing up, I was keenly aware of the loss my mother felt as well as the great love and admiration she had for her father, a quiet country man who raised his three children alone in those desperate times, often working day and night to support them." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
Awards and honors
- Finalist National Book AwardNational Book AwardThe National Book Awards are a set of American literary awards. Started in 1950, the Awards are presented annually to American authors for literature published in the current year. In 1989 the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization which now oversees and manages the National Book...
1988 http://www.nationalbook.org/nba1988.html - Finalist PEN/Faulkner Award for FictionPEN/Faulkner Award for FictionThe PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction is awarded annually by the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to the authors of the year's best works of fiction by living American citizens. The winner receives US $15,000 and each of four runners-up receives US $5000. The foundation brings the winner and runners-up to...
1989 http://www.penfaulkner.org/affWinners01.htm - Five Best Books of 1991 Time Magazine http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,974599,00.html
- Best Books of 1991 American Library AssociationAmerican Library AssociationThe American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
(ALA) Library JournalLibrary JournalLibrary Journal is a trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey . It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional practice... - Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award 1991http://www.barnesandnoble.com/awards/index.asp?PID=17970&
- Oprah Book Club Selection 1997 http://www2.oprah.com/obc/pastbooks/mary_morris/obc_pb_19970618.jhtml
Review excerpts
Vanished“Astonishing… Morris’s book should be judged on its own merits, and against the work of our most highly practiced and accomplished novelists.” Vogue
Vogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
"A dazzling first novel… Events are presented with such authority that they hum with both the authenticity of real life and the mythic power of fable. This is a startling and powerful debut” Michiko Kakutani
Michiko Kakutani
is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning critic for The New York Times and is considered by many to be a leading literary critic in the United States.-Life and career:...
, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEFDF1231F937A35755C0A96E948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1
A Dangerous Woman
“At once deeply thrilling and deeply affecting...should burnish Ms. Morris’s reputation as one of the most skillful new writers at work in America today.” The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE3DE1430F937A35752C0A967958260&scp=15&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"Brilliantly acute ...Remarkable ... Morris' magnanimous ability to portray her characters with so much tenderness and cruelty may be her novel's finest strength." Boston Sunday Globe
Songs In Ordinary Time
“A gritty, beautifully crafted novel rich in wisdom and suspense ... Secures Morris’s status as one of our finest American writers.”
The Miami Herald
The Miami Herald
The Miami Herald is a daily newspaper owned by The McClatchy Company headquartered on Biscayne Bay in the Omni district of Downtown Miami, Florida, United States...
"Morris seems merely to have been sharpening her skills when she wrote Vanished ... and A Dangerous Woman. Now she has brought all her gifts to bear on Songs of Ordinary Time. The flowing sentences and scenes make every page worth reading." The Philadelphia Inquirer
The Philadelphia Inquirer
The Philadelphia Inquirer is a morning daily newspaper that serves the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, metropolitan area of the United States. The newspaper was founded by John R. Walker and John Norvell in June 1829 as The Pennsylvania Inquirer and is the third-oldest surviving daily newspaper in the...
Fiona Range
“Morris is a master storyteller, an acute observer of small-town America and of people who struggle, sometimes in vain, to have lives that amount to more than hard work and a cold bed… Fiona Range, the novel, is a wealth of passion and heartbreak.” USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
“While Morris’ earlier work has often been compared to Steinbeck and McCullers, here she seems unmistakably under the spell of the Bronte sisters ... Morris grounds her storytelling with compelling characterizations and masterful plotting.” New York Newsday
A Hole in the Universe
"Welcome to the world of Mary McGarry Morris — and what a world it is. Richly atmospheric, bristling with dialogue, so tightened with suspense it threatens to snap. Morris is a master at sympathetic portraits of those clinging to the peripheries of society. And nowhere is her talent more evident than in her extraordinary new novel, A Hole in the Universe. Morris [is] a superb storyteller ... and [her] undeniable compassion for and intuitive understanding of her characters' lives make us know and care about these people, too." Washington Post
The Lost Mother
“Never one to shy away from the messy and bleak, Morris unflinchingly illuminates the bitter existence of neglected children and their inspiring resilience, once again proving herself a storyteller of great compassion, insight, and depth.” Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
“The Lost Mother paints a nuanced portrait of small-town life ... Morris’s characters are finely drawn, her dialogue rings true, and the epic sweep of her storytelling draws apt comparison to Dickens and Steinbeck.” The Orlando Sentinel
Biography
Morris was born in Meriden, ConnecticutMeriden, Connecticut
Meriden is a city in New Haven County, Connecticut, United States. According to 2005 Census Bureau estimates, the population of the city is 59,653.-History:...
; was raised in Rutland, Vermont
Rutland (town), Vermont
Rutland is a town in Rutland County, Vermont, United States. The population was 4,054 at the 2010 census. Rutland completely surrounds the city of Rutland, which is incorporated separately from the town of Rutland.-History:...
and currently resides in Andover, Massachusetts
Andover, Massachusetts
Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was incorporated in 1646 and as of the 2010 census, the population was 33,201...
. She married Michael W. Morris and lives with him in Massachusetts. Her husband is a partner in the law firm Morris, Rossi & Hayes in Andover, Massachusetts
Andover, Massachusetts
Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was incorporated in 1646 and as of the 2010 census, the population was 33,201...
. She and her husband had 5 children and, as a result, Morris spent many years writing late at night after her children went to bed. For many years before she was published, Morris did not share with her friends and extended family members that she was writing novels. Her first novel Vanished created a sensation not only for its award nominations, but also for the fact that few in literary circles and in her hometown knew she was a writer. Before she was able to dedicate herself entirely to writing, Morris worked as a social worker for the Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
Department of Public Welfare in Lawrence, Massachusetts
Lawrence, Massachusetts
Lawrence is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States on the Merrimack River. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the city had a total population of 76,377. Surrounding communities include Methuen to the north, Andover to the southwest, and North Andover to the southeast. It and Salem are...
. Not surprisingly given her upbringing and her residence in Andover, Massachusetts, a number of her novels are set in fictional towns in Vermont while parts of Vanished, A Hole in the Universe and The Lost Mother are likewise set in Massachusetts. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
Mary McGarry Morris is not related to the author named "Mary Morris," but may be a distant relative of award-winning writer Jean McGarry
Jean McGarry
Jean McGarry is an author of fiction and a Professor in the program at Johns Hopkins University. She served as chairperson of the department from 1997-2005.She received her BA from Harvard in 1970, and an MA in Writing from JHU in 1983....
. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A02E3D71139F934A35753C1A9619C8B63&scp=1&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6516157.html?q=mary+mcgarry+morris
Quotations
"What continues to fascinate me is how close to the fringe we all are, as close to the bounds of normalcy as to the fringe of chaos, disruption, aberration, and loss." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html"I suppose I am concerned with what my characters are looking for. I am concerned with their yearning -- the constant yearning of the human heart. That is what I feel when I am writing. And what I question." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"There are countless Aubrey Wallaces in this world - little people, pale lives, the briefest, simplest human creatures. They are the shadows in early morning doorways and the solitary late night climbing of wooden stairs. They wash dishes in restaurants and mop floors and pick up litter in the park, and they are always startled to be spoken to, because no one ever does." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE2DE1539F933A15755C0A96E948260&scp=11&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"All parenting requires sacrifice, especially motherhood. Because love is the giving over of one's self to another, there must be sacrifice or else the love is depthless and self-serving." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"Sometimes, charity is far easier given to a stranger on a dark night than to a pauper at our own table." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/fiona_range.html
"I'm often as amused as bewildered to hear characters from my previous novels described as "on the fringe" or "somewhat unusual." It is always surprising to be asked if I know "people like that." Of course I do; we all do. I see them as aspects of all of us." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"I am not part of any literary world. And I have no desire to move into a literary world. I am wary of letting an aura take the place of the effort of writing." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt
"By its very nature and in its healthiest aspects, the child-parent relationship entails discordance, conflict, struggle. I don't think it is ever possible to love a child too much. Often, however, the worst parenting is done in the name of love. And that can run the gamut from excessive permissiveness to abuse." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/lost_mother.html
"I begin with pen and paper. The first draft is written in longhand, with a very real, almost organic sensation of flow from the inside out. In the beginning, strong characters are more important than having a complete plot in mind. For me the story is always contained in the characters." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/a_hole_in_the_universe.html
"Born in Connecticut, raised in Vermont, and for most of my years now a Massachusetts resident living close by the New Hampshire border, I am certainly a New Englander." http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/fiona_range.html
"The core of my life is writing. Without that, I'd be pretty miserable." http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1139F93BA15752C0A967958260&scp=13&sq=%22mary+mcgarry+morris%22&st=nyt