Jennifer Haigh is an award-winning, best-selling novelist and short story writer. Her novels have been published in 16 languages, and her short stories have been published in The Atlantic, Granta, the Saturday Evening Post, Ploughshares, Virginia Quarterly Review, Five Points, Good Housekeeping, and many other magazines. Her four novels -- Faith, The Condition, Baker Towers, and Mrs. Kimble -- are favorites with book clubs, and make Haigh an ideal speaker for colleges and universities, libraries, writing conferences and workshops, and women's groups.
Faith (Harper), Haigh's most recent novel, explores the repercussions of one family's history of silence when a priest's sex scandal forces his family's untold past to surface. Haigh's first novel, Mrs. Kimble (William Morrow), received the 2004 PEN/Hemingway Award for debut fiction. An emotionally compelling story of three unique women married to the same shadowy manipulator and charismatic con man, Mrs. Kimble is a meditation on marriage and a fascinating psychological portrait of mesmerizing opportunist and the women who love him. Baker Towers (William Morrow), a family saga set in a Pennsylvania coal mining town during the industrial boom following World War II, won the 2006 PEN/L.L. Winship Award for outstanding book by a New England Writer, and was a New York Times best-seller. The Condition (Harper) depicts one turbulent year in the lives of the McKotches, a New England family in extremis.
A native of western Pennsylvania, Haigh earned her MFA in fiction at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She lives in the Boston area.
Praise for Jennifer Haigh:
"Jennifer Haigh is an exquisite writer with a special gift. She captures and gives voice to what is essential and true in Northern Appalachia's small towns and rural-industrial spaces. She understands this beautiful and tortured landscape we call home. She loves this place and its people, tenderly delivering them into our homes, ensuring that their lives and their struggles will not be forgotten."
-- Dr. Pamela Twiss, California University of Pennsylvania
Praise for Faith:
"Haigh deals with complex moral issues in subtle ways, and her narrative is beautifully, sometimes achingly poignant."
-- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Haigh explores the intersections of public scandal and personal tragedy in her superb fourth novel ... At its broadest, this is a frank and timely story of familial and institutional heredity; at its most personal, the novel is a devastating portrait of a priest who discovers that he's also a man."
-- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"With an exquisite sense of drama and mystery, Haigh delivers a taut, well-crafted tale that potently but subtly explores myriad gray areas within essential issues of truth and trust, punishment and absolution. Indelibly rendered characters, suspenseful pacing, and fearless but sensitive handling of a controversial subject will make this a must-read for book discussion groups."
-- Booklist (starred review)
"The narrative is emotionally involving and ethically concise, reminding us that things are not always as they seem and that we must consider carefully how we judge others. Most fiction readers will want."
-- Library Journal
Praise for The Condition:
"The Condition is something rare ... Ms. Haigh has a great gift for telling interwoven family stories and doing justice to all the different perspectives they present ... A graceful aspect of Ms. Haigh's storytelling is the way she glides through chronology."
-- New York Times Book Review
"A serious work of fiction and, surprisingly, a page-turner as well ... This novel showcases [Haigh's] considerable talent ... An elegant and perceptive exploration."
-- Seattle Times
"[Haigh] looks unflinchingly at family ties -- the kind that limit and the kind that can actually liberate. The Condition is a satisfying feat of literary choreography."
-- Wall Street Journal
Praise for Baker Towers:
"The living, breathing organism that is Ms. Haigh's captivating book ... [is an] effortlessly haunting story ... with satisfyingly real and vivid individuals."
-- The New York Times
"The lasting power of this novel is in Haigh's gift for capturing the long view and for putting Bakerton itself -- its history and community -- on the literary map... Baker Towers is, finally, a rich portrait of place, its meaning not in the towers themselves but in the community that created them, and Haigh's readers will empathize with Lucy Novak's wish to remain."
-- Washington Post Book World
"Baker Towers is a richly textured and luminous exploration of the fleetingness of time and the special roles we play in each other's lives -- often without knowing."
-- USA Today
Praise for Mrs. Kimble:
"The talent evident in this novel is stunning. The question is not whether Haigh might turn out to be a good writer. Rather, we have the intriguing possibility that the next great American author is already in print."
-- Fort Worth Star-Telegram
"Clever ... admirable debut novel ... Haigh has certainly succeeded in creating a trio of memorable characters. The three Mrs. Kimbles -- a deserted housewife, a frustrated feminist and a disappointed mother -- present the whole gamut of family values gone awry."
-- The Washington Post
"Luminous ... A beautiful novel with memorable vibrant characters."
-- Booklist
"This moving novel explores questions of love and loss -- the first, second and third time around."
-- Glamour