Wayne State College’s Language and Literature Department, the School of Arts and Humanities, and the WSC Press are pleased to hold this fall’s Plains Writers Series on Thursday, December 9, 2021. The Plains Writers Series is held several times a year to bring attention to the prose and poetry of Great Plains writers through reading and interacting with area audiences.

This Plains Writers Series will feature Jerry Wilson, author of Eden to Orizaba, published by Floricanto Press in 2018. The readings will begin at 2 p.m. in the lounge on the second floor of the Humanities Building at Wayne State College.

Following the Plains Writers Series will be the Fiction Slam. The slam will be held at the Max Bar and Grill in downtown Wayne, NE starting at 7:00 p.m., with registration beginning at 6:00 p.m. Slam participants need two short fiction pieces and $5 registration fee. All events are free and open to the public. For more information, please go to wscpress.com.

JERRY WILSON lives with his poet wife, Norma, on the Missouri River bluff near Vermillion, South Dakota, in the geo-solar home they built in 1982. He spends his days reading, writing, nurturing and enjoying their native prairie and woods, and working for environmental sustainability. Jerry has published six books and scores of stories and commentaries in state and national publications, including over 100 stories in South Dakota Magazine, where he was managing editor, and many in Nebraska Life, for which he was a contributing editor.

Most of Jerry’s books explore questions of sustainability. His most recent novel, Eden to Orizaba, is a love story that probes the impact of unrestricted economic forces on Mexican families and communities, driving desperate workers north. His first book, American Artery: A Pan American Journey, takes readers on a socio-historical journey 5,000 miles down North America’s longest road from Canada to Panama (US 81 through Nebraska); Two eco-memoirs, Waiting for Coyote’s Call and its sequel, Seasons of the Coyote, explore Jerry’s interactions in the natural world of Prairie Bluff. His early life gave birth to a collection of short stories, Blackjacks and Blue Devils, and his historical novel, Across the Cimarron, is set in the early years of white settlement in the Cheyenne Arapaho country of western Oklahoma, where he was born.

Jerry earned the PhD in American literature from the University of Oklahoma. He taught literature, journalism and creative writing at several colleges and universities, including the University of South Dakota and Mount Marty College.

Plains Writers Series

Jerry Wilson

December 9 @ 2 p.m. CST.