Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) was a renowned English novelist and poet of the Victorian era, famous for his tales set in the fictional rural region of "Wessex". Originally an architect, he achieved fame with novels like Tess of the d'Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure before focusing on poetry. Lily King is the New York Times bestselling author of six novels- Heart the Lover , Writers & Lovers , Euphoria , Father of the Rain , The English Teacher , and The Pleasing Hour -as well as the story collection Five Tuesdays in Winter . Her work has won numerous prizes and awards, including the Kirkus Prize, the New England Book Award, the Maine Book Award, and a Whiting Award; has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and the Story Prize; and has been longlisted for the Joyce Carol Oates Prize and the Women's Prize for Fiction. Her books have been translated into thirty-two languages. She lives in Portland, Maine. Alice Elliott Dark is the author the novels Fellowship Point and Think of England , and two collections of short stories, In the Gloaming and Naked to the Waist . Her work has appeared in The New Yorker , Harper's Magazine , The New York Times , The Best American Short Stories , and O.

Henry: Prize Stories, among others. She is the director of Rutgers-Newark MFA program.