The College of Saint Elizabeth presents an evening with Tayari Jones, author of the bestselling novel An American Marriage, which explores the far-reaching impact wrongful conviction and incarceration on the lives of all those involved.
Jones will speak on Thursday, March 26, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. in Dolan Performance Hall.
The presentation, “An American Marriage: A Love Story Torn Apart by Social Injustice,” is open to the public and free of charge, but registration is required.
In her fourth book, Jones focuses on Celestial and Roy, a newlywed couple standing on the threshold of the American dream. When Roy is arrested and sentenced to 12 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, their lives implode.
Named by Bill Gates as one of his favorite books of 2019, An American Marriage is an Oprah’s Book Club Selection and on Barack Obama’s summer reading list. The novel also was awarded the Women’s Prize for Fiction (formerly known as the Orange Prize), Aspen Words Prize and an NAACP Image Award.
A member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, Jones also has been a recipient of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, United States Artist Fellowship, NEA Fellowship and Radcliffe Institute Bunting Fellowship. Her third novel, Silver Sparrow, was added to the NEA Big Read Library of classics in 2016.
Jones is a graduate of Spelman College, University of Iowa and Arizona State University. She is an A. D. White Professor at Large at Cornell University and a Professor of Creative Writing at Emory University.
Mary Colleen Robinson has a communication degree with a concentration in journalism and is currently working as the PR/Social Media Specialist at the College of Saint Elizabeth
