Anna Keesey

"I read it at a gallop, and didn't want it to end."

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Madeline Miller, author of The Song of Achilles

"Anna Keesey’s debut novel is historical fiction at its finest—precise and particular in detail, character, and setting, yet vast and epic in scope and theme. Little Century is a remarkable achievement."

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Larry Watson, author of Montana, 1948

"With its beautiful language, memorable characters, and compelling story, Little Century is sure to gain a wide and appreciative audience."

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Ron Rash, author of Serena

"[…]A confidently energetic tale of an 18-year-old orphan who leaves Chicago to eke out a new life for herself in Century, Ore., at the turn of the 20th century."

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Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Little Century's heroine, Esther Chambers, is the kind found in the best of classic literature: an innocent[...]whose essential goodness and loyalty shines through the savagery around her."

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Kathleen Kent, author of The Heretic’s Daughter

"One of summer's six 'most exhilarating novels'"

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Vogue Magazine

"Dwindling resources, bribery, and corruption--issues as current as this morning's newspaper--mix with optimism in Little Century, Anna Keesey's briskly romantic, nontraditional western, set in central Oregon circa 1900."

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Liza Nelson, O Magazine

"Keesey writes lyrically and examines the ferocity of frontier life with an unromantic and penetrating gaze."

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Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"In this novel of stunning beauty, [...a]n incredible debut—and a writer to watch."

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Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife

"Here is a fine novel, written with grace... a frontier saga, a love story, and an epic of many small pleasures."

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Joshua Ferris, author of And Then We Came to the End

"[Keesey's] uncanny historical imagination [...] takes the breath away."

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Peter Ho Davies, author of The Welsh Girl

Latest from the blog

The meaning of “Terroir”

The 2013 Terroir Creative Writing festival is coming up: April 27th in lovely McMinnville, Oregon.  I’ll be speaking on the topic of “Buried Treasure,” making reference not only to a galvanizing quotation by Ralph Waldo Emerson, but to the idea of terroir, which is the unique flavor of place, including that place’s geography and soils and weather, that influences a plant and its fruit and gives its wine or chocolate or tea or what-have-you the particularity of that specific hillside or field.  Terroir means locale, nativity, philopatry: where home is, what draws us home, and what of home we carry with us as we travel and as we write.

I’m therefore delighted to be speaking about native soil on what is truly my native soil: the Willamette Valley of Oregon.  I’ll be signing copies of Little Century, as well as seeking to rub shoulders with Monica Drake, Peter Ames Carlin, and other terrific writers.  Also: if you’ve not had a chance to work with the gifted Linfield College poet and teacher Lex Runciman, now is your chance.  Learn more about the festival, which is sponsored by the Arts Alliance of Yamhill County, and register for it here.

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Associated Writing Programs panel discussion: Purpose and the Practical in Historical Fiction

That March Madness you hear about in Boston this week is the annual conference of the Associate Writing Programs, the professional organization of imaginative writers and writing teachers, with 11,000 participants expected.  I’ll be there hoovering up inspiration and also moderating a dy-no-mite panel discussion on historical fiction with fellow purveyors Emily Barton (The Testament of Yves Gundron and Brookland), Zachary Lazar (Sway and Evening’s Empire), and Peter Ho Davies (The Welsh Girl, and more Best American and O.Henry prizes for short fiction than you can shake a stick at).  The panel takes place Friday morning at 9 am.  Hope to cross paths with some readers and friends and reader-friends!

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“This book surprised me”: a new review from Propeller Magazine

Little Century by Anna Keesey | Aisles | Propeller.

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