Middlesex Community College will host award-winning writer Frederick Reiken as part of the Visiting Writers Series. The event will take place at 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday, November 19 in the Bedford Campus Café East.
“Until you start to think about, discuss and practice writing in a conscious way,
it tends to be an automatic or reflexive process, rather than one that can be crafted
in a deliberate and often more effective manner,” Reiken said. “It may not be apparent,
for instance, that there are a wide variety of styles for writing dialogue or that
dialogue can work on a number of different narrative levels at once. Likewise, the
point-of-view choice you make for a short story will actually affect what kind of
story you can tell. Once students learn things like this and begin to explore them
in their own creative work, they may find that their stories or poems get better quickly
– both in technique and content – which are in many ways inextricable. Along with
reading a lot – which is the number one most important thing an aspiring writer should
do – learning new things about craft can be a great and valuable way to inspire your
own writing process.”
A creative writing professor at Emerson College, Reiken is a former news reporter, columnist and nature writer. Author of three novels, his works have been translated into seven languages. His novel “Day for Night” was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in fiction and cited as one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post.
Reiken’s debut novel “The Odd Sea” won the Hackney Literary Award for a first novel, was a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize, and was cited as one of the best first novels of the year by Library Journal and Booklist. His follow-up “The Lost Legends of New Jersey” was a national bestseller and a New York Times Notable Book.
Widely published, his short stories have appeared in publications including The New Yorker, Glimmer Train, Gulf Coast, and Western Humanities Review. His essays on craft have also appeared in The Writer’s Chronicle.
The MCC Visiting Writers Series is co-sponsored by the Creative Writing Program and the Office of Student Engagement.
MCC’s Café East is located in the Campus Center Building at 591 Springs Road in Bedford. Parking is available on-campus.