Member Evan Morgan Williams, award-winning fiction writer, is the first guest of the Ars Poetica Reading Series at Eastern Oregon University. The reading will be held at 7:30pm Wednesday, April 22. Williams will share selections from his latest collection of short stories, “Thorn,” which won the 2014 G.S. Sharat Chandra Prize for short fiction.

Williams’ stories are works of realistic fiction set mainly in the American West. In an interview in Antioch Review, Williams said his characters are “grappling with change…and I don’t go easy on them.”

Williams has published over forty stories in literary magazines including Witness, Kenyon Review, Antioch Review, Alaska Quarterly and Northwest Review. Williams received an MFA from the University of Montana and now lives and teaches in Portland, Oregon.

Williams recently held a book signing at AWP Bookfair 2015 in Minneapolis.

On April 23, World Book Night, he will be delivering copies of his book to Little Free Libraries throughout Portland. “Thorn” is available at Wallace Books in Sellwood, Portland. Follow Williams at his blog.