Biography

Joshilyn Jackson

New York Times Bestselling novelist Joshilyn Jackson was born in the Deep South and raised by a tribe of wild fundamentalists who taught her to be virtuous and upright. Unfortunately, it didn't take, and Ms. Jackson dropped out of college to pursue a career as an actor. She worked in regional repertoire, wrote plays, and traveled the southern third of the country with a dinner theatre troupe.

She decided both virtue and an education were worth the work, so she went back to college to study English literature, focusing on Modern and Medieval Theater. She graduated with honors from Georgia State. She moved to Chicago and managed to recover from a near-terminal case of culture shock just in time to earn her MA in English from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Ms. Jackson taught English at UIC, trying to explain the function of the gerund and why Moby Dick is a great book to crowds of hung-over 18 year olds. In her first year of teaching, she won the Student's Choice Award for Best English Instructor.

After graduate school she ran for warmer climes, returning to her hometown and marrying the boy next door. She currently lives just outside of Atlanta with her husband, their two children, a hound dog, and a twenty-three-pound, one-eyed Maine Coon cat named Franz Schubert.

Her short fiction has been published in literary magazines and anthologies including TriQuarterly and Calyx. Her bestselling debut novel, gods in Alabama won SIBA's 2005 Novel of the year Award and was a #1 BookSense pick. Between, Georgia was also a #1 BookSense pick, making Jackson the first author in BookSense history to receive #1 status in back to back years. Jackson read the audio version herself, winning a Listen Up award from Publisher's Weekly and making Audiofile's Best of 2006 list. Jackson also read the audio version of her third novel, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming, and was shortlisted for an Audie Award. All three of her books have been chosen for the Books-A-Million Book Club.

Backseat Saints is forthcoming from Grand Central Publishing in June of 2010. It tells the story of Rose Mae Lolley, a fierce, tiny ball of war wounds who was a minor character in gods in Alabama. Her life changes dramatically when she meets an airport gypsy who shares her past and knows her future. The gypsy's dire prediction: Ro's handsome, violent husband is going to kill her - unless she kills him first...

Jackson is at work on her next novel, currently titled The Other Mosey Slocumb.