UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Novelist Stephen Graham Jones will offer a reading at Penn State as part of this year’s Rolling Reading Series. The reading, which will take place at 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, November 8th, in Paterno Library’s Foster Auditorium on the University Park campus, will be free and open to the public. 

Stephen Graham Jones is the New York Times bestselling author of nearly thirty novels, novellas, collections, and comic books. His doctoral dissertation at Florida State University later became his debut novel “The Fast Red Road: A Plainsong” (2000) and was praised by Native American Renaissance writer and scholar Gerald Vizenor. Many of his works reside in horror, science fiction, and experimental fiction genres and have received literary acclaim. His popular and recent works include the novels “The Only Good Indians” (2020), described by The New York Times as “gritty and gorgeous,” and “My Heart is a Chainsaw,” Book 1 in The Indian Lake Trilogy (2021), Winner of the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel. The Indian Lake Trilogy Book 2, “Don’t Fear the Reaper,” is set to be released in February 2023.   

Jones’ lifelong admiration for horror movies, and his inspiration at first viewing “Scream” in 1996, is distinctly reflected in his work. His novel “My Heart Is a Chainsaw” was described by novelist Alma Katsu as “an homage to slasher films that also manages to defy and transcend genre.” National Book Award winner and author Tananarive Due described Jones as “a literary master who happens to write horror,” noting “you’ve never read a book quite like ‘The Only Good Indians.’”  

Jones’ many awards include an NEA grant, the LA Times Ray Bradbury Prize, four Bram Stoker Awards, two Shirley Jackson Awards, and five This is Horror Awards. Jones resides in Boulder, Colorado, with his wife, children, and dogs. He is the Ivena Baldwin Professor of English at the University of Colorado and is an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Tribe of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation of Montana.