Wizowaty, Suzi 1954-

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WIZOWATY, Suzi 1954-

PERSONAL: Born January 6, 1954, in Cincinnati, OH; daughter of Jerold (in business) and Judith (an art historian; maiden name, Vaughan) Wizowaty; companion of Joan Robinson (an arts educator). Education: Princeton University, B.A. (cum laude), 1977; Goddard College, M.A., 1985. Politics: "Progressive-liberal." Religion: Jewish/Buddhist. Hobbies and other interests: Literature, performing and visual arts, Buddhism.

ADDRESSES: Agent—Ginger Knowlton, Curtis Brown Ltd., 10 Astor Pl., New York, NY 10003. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Interstate Consortium, Trenton, NJ, assistant to the director, 1980; Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, NJ, bookstore manager, 1980–85; Champlain College, Burlington, VT, editor and assistant director of marketing, 1986; Goddard College, Plainfield, VT, adjunct faculty member, 1986–2001; St. Michael's College, Colchester, VT, adjunct faculty in creative writing, 2001–. Also worked as adjunct faculty member at Trinity College, Burlington, 1990–91, and St. Michael's College, 1991–93. Fletcher Free Library, director of outreach services, 1987–91; South Burlington Community Library, program director, 1991–95; Vermont Council on the Humanities, coordinator of literacy program, 1995–96, program director, 1996–99; Northern New England Tradeswomen, associate director, 2001–02. Gives readings from her works; lecturer and workshop presenter; consultant. Member of board of directors, Princeton Nursery School, 1983–84, Burlington Peace and Justice Center, 1986–87, and Vermont New Jewish Agenda, 1986–88; New Jewish Agenda, member of national feminist task force, 1987–88; Samara Foundation of Vermont, chair of trusteeship committee and development committee, 1999–2002; Vermont Unity Project, member of advisory committee, 2000–02.

AWARDS, HONORS: Grant from New Jersey State Arts Council, 1985; Sydney Taylor Manuscript Award, Association of Jewish Libraries, 1989, for "Borders"; grant from Vermont Arts Council, 2003; Booksense 76 List, 2003, for The Round Barn.

WRITINGS:

The Round Barn (novel), Hardscrabble Books (Hanover, NH), 2002.

A Tour of Evil (novel), Philomel (New York, NY), 2005.

Author of book-length publications for Shelburne Museum, Shelburne Farms, and Lake Champlain Maritime Museum.; author of unpublished children's books, including "Borders." Work represented in Women Reflect about Princeton, Princeton University (Princeton, NJ), 1989. Contributor of fiction, essays, and reviews to periodicals, including Bottomfish, Bridges, K'fari, Out in the Mountains, Fathers, and Vermont Woman.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Queenie's Curse, a children's novel; Three, an adult novel.

SIDELIGHTS: Suzi Wizowaty told CA: "For several years as a child I lived in Europe, moving often and making few friends. This and the voracious reading habits and extensive library of my parents contributed to my taking refuge in books from an early age. In Europe, my mother, who later became an art historian, swept her family along every weekend to art museums, houses of painters or sculptors, cathedrals, and out-of-the-way chapels that might have a famous Pieta. As a child I must have been bored at times, but all I remember is my delight in the endless mystery of such places. My novel A Tour of Evil draws on my memory of dim, cold, thrilling French cathedrals.

"I've been writing all my life, beginning when I was six or seven with a short story about a creature whose head touched the moon. But it was not until I was forty-eight, after having written four books, that my first book, The Round Barn, was published.

"My work in progress, an adult novel tentatively called Three, concerns a couple whose only son has died. It's about what happens when the son's best friend comes back into their lives eight years later. The subject of a child's death and its effect on a family will always interest me. When I was twenty-one, my twenty-year-old brother was killed; I explored this as well in an earlier unpublished book for children, The Life and Death of Jesse Skupinski."