Ciabattari, Jane

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Ciabattari, Jane

PERSONAL: Born in Emporia, KS; married; husband's name Mark (a writer). Education: Stanford University, B.A.; San Francisco State University, M.A.

ADDRESSES: Home—Sag Harbor, NY; New York, NY; Windham, NY. Agent—Ellen Levine, Trident Media Group, LLC, 41 Madison Ave., 36th Fl., New York, NY 10010. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Journalist, editor, short story writer, teacher of writing. Parade magazine, former contributing editor; California Living, former managing editor; Red-book, former managing editor; Dial magazine, former editor in chief; McCall's, senior consulting editor in fiction. Worked as a reporter and columnist for the Montana Standard, Butte, MT. Knox College, Galesburg, IL, Distinguished Writer in Residence/Visiting Professor of English, 2004; Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, New York, NY, writing instructor; New York University, New York, NY, writing instructor; Squaw Valley Community of Writers, writing instructor; Borderlands writing workshop, Tenants Harbor, ME, writing instructor; former fiction writer in residence, Chautauqua Institution's Writers' Center, 2003, 2005; associate faculty, Bennington College Low-Residency Writing Program, Bennington, VT. Story magazine, member of editorial board; Women's Media Group, past president; Overseas Press Club of America, former vice president; Women's Enews, member of the board and nominating chair; National Book Critics Circle, board member.

MEMBER: Authors Guild, PEN.

AWARDS, HONORS: Special Mention, Pushcart Prize, for "Payback Time"; Editors' Choice STUBBY Award, Hampton Shorts, 1996; fiction fellowships, New York Foundation for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, and The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.

WRITINGS:

Winning Moves: How to Come Out Ahead in a Corporate Shakeup, Penguin USA (New York, NY), 1989.

Stealing the Fire (short stories), Canio's Editions (Sagaponik, NY), 2002.

Contributor of short stories to the anthology The Best Underground Fiction, 2006, and to periodicals, including Ms., North American Review, Denver Quarterly, Hampton Shorts, East Hampton Star, Blueline, Caprice, and Redbook. Contributor of articles and reviews to Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Ms., Poets & Writers, East Hampton Star, Kirkus Reviews, Threepenny Review, Psychology Today, and the Columbia Journalism Review.

SIDELIGHTS: A former contributing editor and columnist for Parade magazine, writer Jane Ciabattari has also authored book-length works, including the nonfiction title, Winning Moves: How to Come Out Ahead in a Corporate Shakeup, and the highly praised 2002 collection of short stories, Stealing the Fire. Reviewing the latter title, a Publishers Weekly contributor noted that "dealing with loss" is the unifying theme in the "solid debut collection." Such loss is both very tangible, as in the death of a father in "Stealing the Fire," or the loss of innocence, as in "A Pilgrimage." A critic for Kirkus Reviews had further praise for the collection and Ciabattari, calling the author a "master of transformation." The same reviewer concluded that these stories were "written with heart." Similarly, Joyce Sparrow, writing in Library Journal, commended the stories that "explore how change affects our lives."