FARMINGTON — The University of Maine at Farmington is excited to present authors Kathryn Davis and Ann Joslin Williiams as the first readers of the 2026 Visiting Writers series. Davis and Williams will read from their work at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 24 in The Landing in the UMF Olsen Student Center. The reading is free and open to the public.
An author of six novels and the recipient of the Lannan Literary Award for Fiction and a Guggenheim Fellowship, Davis’ first memoir “Aurelia, Aurélia” (Greywolf Press, 2022) has been listed as Best Book of 2022 by The New Yorker and a Kirkus Review Best Memoir of 2022.
New York Times Book reviewer Molly Young writes, “[Kathryn Davis] has written a memoir that mimics the atemporal quality of the episodes that give meaning to life,” and the Los Angeles Times’ Lesie Pariseau calls Aurelia, Aurélia “A glimmering memoir like none you’ve ever read.”
Davis is known for her formal innovation, from her novel “Hell,” in which households from different historical periods coexist, to “Duplex,” which brings sorcerers together with humans and bodies without souls.
The Chicago Tribune has called Davis “one of the most inventive novelists at work today.” For twenty years, she has shared her insights on narrative and craft in her novel workshops in the MFA program at Washington University in Saint Louis.
Williams is the recipient of awards from the National Endowment of the Arts, the Spokane Prize for Short Fiction, the New Hampshire Writers’ Project Literary Awards, and the Stegner Program at Stanford University. Her newest novel “Skyland” (Islandport Press, 2026), was released this past spring.
Author Ann Packer calls Skyland, “An achingly lovely novel about what happens when an act of violence tears apart a family. Skyland shows us that we may be able to find our way back from the unthinkable–slowly and painfully, to be sure, but not without moments of beauty.”
Williams’ raw storytelling and lyrical prose speak not only of the rawness of trauma, sorrow and healing, but also mirrors the rugged rural New England landscapes she so clearly loves.
As author Julie Orringer aptly writes, Williams’ writing “reaches far beneath the surface of human experience to reveal the roots of love and illuminate the depths of loss.” Williams’ short stories and essays have been published in the Iowa Review, Ploughshares, and Outlook Springs, among others. She is an associate professor emerita of English at the University of New Hampshire.
The Visiting Writer Series is sponsored by the UMF Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program.