Award-Winning Novelist and Screenwriter to Speak at Holy Cross

WORCESTER, Mass. – Award-winning novelist and screenwriter Tom Perrotta will read his works on Thursday, Oct. 28 at 7:30 p.m. in the Levis Browsing Room in Dinand Library at the College of the Holy Cross. The event, sponsored by the College’s Creative Writing Program, is free and open to the public.

Perrotta is an accomplished novelist and screenwriter.  He made his literary debut in 1995 with a collection of coming-of-age short stories, Bad Haircut: Stories of the Seventies (Bridgeworks, 1995).  His novels Little Children (St. Martin’s Press, 2004) and Election (Penguin/Putnam, 1998) were both made into Golden Globe nominated films.  Perrotta co-wrote the script for Little Children and his adaptation of the novel earned him a Golden Globe nomination from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and an Oscar nomination by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in the “Writing- Adapted Screenplay” category. His most recent novels include The Abstinence Teacher (Martin's Press, 2007), which he adapted as a screenplay for a film that is currently in development;  and The Leftovers, about a suburban town trying to survive an apocalypse, is forthcoming.

The Smile on Happy Chang's Face was named one of the Best Short Stories of 2005 and is the inaugural selection for One City One Story, part of the 2010 Boston Book Festival this month. The project encourages people in and around Boston to read the same short story and create community around the shared reading experience.

Perrotta lives with his wife and two children in Belmont, Mass.