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In This Issue Elizabeth McDavid Jones Wins Edgar Award Chair'
s Corner Darrell Hurst Nominated for Distinguished Alumni Award Dilworth and Kirkland Establish Grad Student Development Fund Shannon Meek Memorial Creative Writing Award Bizzaro and Sullivan Win University Awards |
Elizabeth Jones Wins Edgar National writing award given to ECU English grad When Elizabeth McDavid Jones came to ECU in 1993, she knew she wanted to write for kids. She may have dreamed of writing children's books. But she didn't expect to write mysteries, and never imagined that her first novel would win the Edgar Allan Poe Award. Jones (M.A. 1996) accepted the award -- the highest honor given by the Mystery Writers of America -- at the MWA Banquet in New York this past May.
"I'd been trying to psyche myself up so I wouldn't be too disappointed, because I didn't think I'd really win it," she says. "I didn't think anything like that could ever happen to me." The Edgar is given annually for the best work in five categories: fiction, nonfiction, short stories, juvenile and young adult fiction, and screenplay. Jones's novel won in the juvenile and young adult fiction category. Her winning work, The Night Flyers, is a volume in the American Girls History Mysteries series published by Pleasant Company. The series is marketed for girls ten and older. Each book takes place during a crucial time in American history, and stars an 11- or 12-year-old protagonist confronted with a mystery. Jones's novel is set in Eastern North Carolina during World War I, where girl heroine Pam Lowder and her dad raise homing pigeons for the war effort. When the pigeons begin to disappear at night, Pam must solve the mystery; in doing so, she uncovers evidence of an enemy spy. Jones took several creative writing courses as an M.A.
student at ECU, but ended up concentrating in literature, writing a thesis
on Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. Since graduating
in 1996, she has taught at Pitt Community College and has written two
other novels for the American Girls Series: Secrets on 26th Street
and Watcher in the Piney Woods, due out this fall. She lives
in Greenville with her husband and four children. English Dept Home | English Dept Journals | English Dept Contents |
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