BEMIDJI, Minn. — Sheila O’Connor will headline a Friday, March 20, reading and reception for women whose works were published in the 2009 edition of “Dust and Fire,” Bemidji State University’s anthology of women’s writing and art.

O’Connor is the author of “Tokens of Grade: A Novel in Stories” and the novel “Where No Gods Came,” winner of the 2003 Michigan Award for Literary Fiction and the 2004 Minnesota Book Award for Fiction. She is a Bush Fellowship winner and teaches at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minn.

The reception will begin at noon at Bemidji State’s American Indian Resource Center, and will feature a reading by O’Connor. Refreshments will be served.

After 11:30 a.m., parking for the reading will be available in the parking lot of Bangsberg Hall on the Bemidji State campus.

From 7-9 p.m., a reading and reception for “Dust and Fire” contributors will be held at the American Indian Resource Center. Following an introduction by O’Connor, authors featured in the anthology are invited to read their entries to the group.

Dozens of individuals had works selected for the 23rd “Dust & Fire,” which was produced by the BSU Department of English and the women’s studies program.  The anthology features fiction, non-fiction, poetry and art from women residing in Minnesota or its contiguous states and provinces.

Copies of the 2009 edition of “Dust and Fire” will be available for purchase at the reception.

Both the noon reading at the Crying Wolf Room and the 7 p.m. reading and reception at the AIRC are open to the public.

For more information about the reception, please contact Michelle Hawkins. Information regarding “Dust and Fire” is available on the Web at http://www.bemidjistate.edu/academics/publications/dust_and_fire, or by contacting Faculty Editor Maureen Gibbon at (218) 755-4021.

FOR YOUR CALENDAR
March 20 – noon – Public reception for “Dust and Fire,” an anthology of women’s writing published by Bemidji State University. Reading by Sheila O’Connor, Hamline University. Reception for artists included in anthology to follow at 7 p.m. Location: American Indian Resource Center. Information: Michelle Hawkins, (218) 755-4021.