BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – The Seventh Annual Ames/Milner Visiting Author Program will welcome novelist Tim O’Brien on Thursday, Oct. 23.
Hailed as “the best American writer of his generation” by the San Francisco Chronicle, O’Brien is the author of eight books, most notably The Things They Carried, a collection of related stories about a platoon of American soldiers in the Vietnam War. He received much acclaim following the novel’s 1990 publication and subsequent nomination for the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award. The book won the Chicago Tribune Heartland Award in fiction, the New York Times named it one of the 20 best books of the last quarter century and noted author John Updike selected the title story for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories of the Century.
Following is the schedule for the Visiting Author program on Oct. 23:
• 2 p.m.-3 p.m.: Presentation followed by a question and answer session at the Center Court of the Hansen Student Center (300 Beecher St., Bloomington), Illinois Wesleyan University
• 7 p.m. to 8 p.m.: Presentation followed by a question and answer session at Braden Auditorium of the Bone Student Center (100 University St., Normal), Illinois State University. A book signing will follow in the Barnes and Noble College Bookstore, also in the Bone Student Center