WRIGHT, Vinita Hampton 1958-

PERSONAL: Born 1958, in KS; married a photographer, 1990. Education: Wheaton College, M.A.

ADDRESSES: Home—Chicago, IL. Offıce—Loyola Press, 3441 North Ashland Ave., Chicago, IL 60657.

CAREER: Writer, editor, and compiler. Harold Shaw Publishers, editor; Tyndale House, editor; Loyola Press, Chicago, IL, editorial director of trade books division, currently senior book editor.

WRITINGS:

(Compiler, with Carol Plueddemann) World Shapers: A Treasury of Quotes from Great Missionaries, H. Shaw Publishers (Wheaton, IL), 1991.

(Compiler, with Carol Plueddemann) Prayers around the Family Table: Dinner-time Discussion and Prayer, H. Shaw Publishers (Wheaton, IL), 1992.

(Editor) Prayers across the Centuries: Abraham, Jesus, St. Augustine, Martin Luther, Susanna Wesley, H. Shaw Publishers (Wheaton, IL), 1993.

(Compiler, with Mary Horner) Women's Widsom through the Ages: Timeless Quotations on Life and Faith, Testament Books (New York, NY), 1994.

(Compiler, with Carol Plueddemann) Family Prayers for All Occasions, H. Shaw Publishers (Wheaton, IL), 1995.

(Compiler, with Keith Call) A Dickens Christmas Collection, H. Shaw Publishers (Wheaton, IL), 1995.

Grace at Bender Springs: A Novel, Broadman & Holman (Nashville, TN), 1999.

Velma Still Cooks in Leeway (novel), Broadman & Holman (Nashville, TN), 2000.

Simple Acts of Moving Forward: A Little Book about Getting Unstuck, Shaw Books (Colorado Springs, CO), 2003.

WORK IN PROGRESS: A novel about a family enduring an Iowa farm crisis and the changing character of rural life.

SIDELIGHTS: Born and raised in a small town in Kansas, Vinita Hampton Wright was intending to pursue a career in music education and performance when she traveled in her early twenties to Jordan to teach English and music in a Baptist school. While she was working there, however, she realized that she wanted to become a writer.

Inspired to write a story about grace after viewing the film Miss Firecracker, Wright sat down and began Grace at Bender Springs, which also drew from the experiences of her youth in Kansas. Although the initial Christian publishing house halted publication of the novel at the eleventh hour, within the following year Wright had landed an agent and a three-book contract with another Christian publisher, Broadman & Holman.

Wright honed what was originally a collection of short stories into a novel. Grace at Bender Springs: A Novel uses the metaphor of a drought to explore a "community's spiritual dryness." In the end, grace "haltingly, mysteriously flows through the parched town." In his Booklist review, John Mort noted that "seldom is Christian fiction so well informed and potent" as Wright's novel. Called "cross-over" fiction, Grace at Bender Springs has appealed to a broad audience. Reviewing Grace at Bender Springs in Publishers Weekly, Jana Riess called the book "a deeply resonant novel about healing."

According to interviewer Lauren F. Winner, writing in Christianity Today, Wright's second novel, Velma Still Cooks in Leeway, "also tackles a theological theme, this time forgiveness." The narrator is Velma, a short-order cook at her own restaurant. Again the story unfolds through a series of points of view. John Mort, writing in Booklist, considered Wright's story of an aging widow in a town in need of forgiveness "a worthy successor to her fine debut novel." A reviewer in Publishers Weekly described Velma Still Cooks in Leeway as "a cosmic drama of divine grace" and "an extraordinary, character-driven novel."

Interviewing the author for Publishers Weekly, Jana Riess asked Wright whether her novels "fill a need in the world of Christian fiction." Wright responded: "What I want to do is present real Christians in my books. I think these people are worth knowing and they're worth knowing, just the way they are. They're learning things about themselves and other people, and they're learning how faith works and who God is in ever-changing situations." In her Publishers Weekly review, Riess noted that Velma Still Cooks in Leeway "is driven . . . by the quiet dignity of ordinary people weathering extraordinary trials." In Wright's own observation: "Spirituality is just very interesting, and I love exploring that with characters. A character without that spiritual dynamic is just as flat as a character without a sexual dynamic."

One of Wright's challenges is finding enough time to write. She told Riess that she "takes two weeks of paid and two weeks of unpaid vacation each year to write full-time." The remainder of the year she works as an editor of nonfiction at Loyola Press and makes room for writing time during evenings and weekends.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

periodicals

Booklist, October 1, 1999, John Mort, review of Grace at Bender Spring: A Novel, p. 326; October 1, 2000, John Mort, review of Velma Still Cooks in Leeway, p. 304.

Christianity Today, April 23, 2001, Lauren F. Winner, "The Wright Stuff," p. 84.

Publishers Weekly, August 30, 1999, Jana Riess, review of Grace at Bender Springs, p. S15; July 24, 2000, review of Velma Still Cooks in Leeway, p. 66; September 18, 2000, Jana Riess, "Vinita Hampton Wright: A Life of Quiet Grace," p. 82.*