“We have five or six come each year,” Brady Allen, a professor in the English Language and Literatures Department, said.
According to Allen, the visiting writers program invited Massie because she is an Appalachian writer and many WSU students and their families come from that area. Also, she has been a public school teacher for 19 years and still does writing workshops.
Her novella, “Stephen,” was awarded the Bram Stoker Award and was a World Fantasy Award finalist. She has published numerous novels, including the Bram Stoker-winning “Sineater.”
She has also had several short story collections published, including “Southern Discomfort,” “Shadow Dreams” and “Naked, On the Edge.” Some of her Young Adult fiction work includes the “Young Founders” series and the “Daughters of Liberty” trilogy.
Writing is not the only reason that Massie caught the Visiting Writer’s Committee’s attention.
“She is an activist,” Allan said. “She is very familiar with bullying and she is one of those people who doesn’t just talk. She gets out there and creates things. And she created a program that is a bullying awareness program.”
Allan described Massie’s anti-bullying program as interactive. Students will be provided with materials to make a bracelet and make a commitment to stand up for someone being bullied.
Due to Massie’s charity work, other campus organizations such as the Women’s Center, Women’s Studies, the GLBTQA Resource Room and the College of Education and Human Services contributed to bringing Massie to campus.
Elizabeth Massie’s anti-bullying lecture was on Nov. 13 from 12:30-1:50 p.m. in Rike Hall. On Nov. 14, she will have a fiction reading and discussion from 3:35-5:00 p.m., in Millett Hall in room 286. This event is free and open to the public.
“She is one of those people we are all jealous of, you know,” Allan said. “She does everything and she does it all well.”
