Biography

Kent Meyers grew up on a small farm in southern Minnesota, attended the University of Minnesota, Morris, and obtained a Master's degree from Washington State University. His first novel, The River Warren, was a finalist in the Barnes & Noble Discover Series Award and also a finalist in the Society of Midland Authors book awards. The Witness of Combines, a collection of essays, won the Friends of American Authors Award in 1998 and was a finalist in the PEN/West Awards the same year. Light in the Crossing, a collection of short stories, was a New York Times Notable Book in 1999, and The River Warren was a Notable Paperback that same year.

Kent has received fellowships from the South Dakota Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. He has published fiction and non-fiction in national literary journals, including The Georgia Review, The Southern Review, Quarterly West, Black Warrior Review, New England Review, Crazyhorse, Crosscurrents, and the Sonora Review. His work has also been anthologized by W. W. Norton and published in The Los Angeles Times. He has won awards for several of his stories.

Kent is an English professor at Black Hills State University and also teaches at the Rainier Writers Workshop MFA program at Pacific Lutheran University. He resides in Spearfish, South Dakota.