Here are seven author shoutouts for this week. Check out which authors are your favorites, and discover an author you’ve never read before. You can find the books relating to our author picks at our bookshop, on our list of Author Shoutouts.
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You can find the books relating to our Author Shoutouts at our bookshop, on our list of LitStack Author Shoutouts.
This Week’s Author Shoutouts
Alexandre Dumas
Alexandre Dumas was born in Villers-Cotterêts, Aisne, France. His thrilling stories, including The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers, have established him as one of the most widely read French writers ever. They have also inspired almost 200 films and numerous adaptations in various forms of media. His early fascination with his father’s heroic tales from the French Revolutionary War, despite his father passing away when he was four, sparked his imaginative spirit.
He demonstrated great marketing skills for his own creations and successfully established a newspaper known as L’Indipendente, as well as the Théâtre Historique in Paris. He passed away in 1870 at the age of 68.
Mur Lafferty
Mur Lafferty, a writer and podcaster, has been involved in podcasting since 2004. Her podcasting journey began with Geek Fu Action Grip, followed by I Should Be Writing, which earned her the prestigious 2007 Parsec Award for Best Writing. From 2010 to 2012, she served as the editor and host of Escape Pod, a science fiction podcast magazine. In 2013, Mur Lafferty authored the urban fantasy novel The Shambling Guide to New York City, which was followed by its recent sequel, A Ghost Train to New Orleans. Her outstanding contributions to the field earned her the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer in 2013.
Her book, Station Eternity, was published in 2023 and its follow up, Chaos Terminal, released in late 2023.
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw, the renowned playwright who won the Nobel Prize, was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1856. Throughout his career, he authored over 60 plays, notably Pygmalion (which served as the basis for the popular musical My Fair Lady), as well as Arms and the Man, Major Barbara, and Man and Superman. Shaw fearlessly expressed his controversial viewpoints, supporting eugenics and opposing vaccinations, while also admiring figures such as Mussolini and Stalin. He also held a disdain for melodrama, the prevalent theatrical genre of the time, and instead introduced a new era of intelligent theater.
He is regarded as the second most influential figure in Western theater, after Shakespeare, owing to his artistic contributions and perspectives on theater and culture. He passed away at the age of 94 when he fell from a tree he was trimming.
Kate Elliott
Kate Elliott has authored more than 30 novels, including the renowned Crown of Stars epic fantasy series, the alt-history fantasy series Cold Magic, the YA fantasy series Court of Fives, and the epic fantasy trilogy Crossroads (among others). In 2020, she released Unconquerable Sun, the initial installment of her gender bending space opera trilogy The Sun Chronicles (inspired by Alexander the Great). The second book, Furious Heaven, was published in 2023.
Kates currently resides in Hawaii, with her main emphasis being on creating immersive worlds and placing women at the forefront of grand narratives that involve adventure and significant cultural evolution.
Beatrix Potter
Beatrix Potter, born in London, England in 1866, is best known for her renowned work, The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Her distinctive artistic style and the affectionate portrayal of the animals in her extensive collection of 23 books are instantly identifiable. While she was raised in a relatively secluded family in London, her summers were cherished in Scotland and the Lake District, fostering her enduring passion for the beauty of nature.
She became a natural scientist and advocate for conservation, subsequently assuming the role of a farmer and activist for land preservation. Her endeavors involved acquiring land and later bestowing it upon the National Trust. At the age of 77, she passed away due to pneumonia and heart disease.
Chang-Rae Lee
Novelist Chang-Rae Lee, originally from South Korea, relocated to the United States with his family at the age of three. He has authored six novels to date, receiving accolades such as the PEN/Hemingway Award for Native Speaker, the Asian/American Literary Award for A Gesture Life, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Additionally, his 2010 novel The Surrendered earned him a Pulitzer Prize nomination.
The National Book Critics Circle Award recognized his novel, On Such a Full Sea, published in 2014, as a finalist. The New York Times Book Review has described his recent work, My Year Abroad, as a profound exploration of personal identity, proclaiming it as a manifesto to finding true happiness by embracing one’s true self.
Emily Brontë
Emily Brontë, born in 1818, came into this world in the village of Thornton, West Riding of Yorkshire, England. As the second child among the three Brontë sisters known for their literary talents, Emily possessed an intensely introverted nature and had limited social connections outside her family circle. Her ventures outside the family abode were mainly restricted to attending church services and strolling through the nearby rural landscapes. Despite her reserved disposition, Emily managed to pen down a remarkably fervent novel titled Wuthering Heights.
She never was able to realize the success of her book, Wuthering Heights for she died of tuberculosis a year after its publication, at age 30.
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