Ellen Akins

{{Infobox person

| name = Ellen Akins

| birth_place = South Bend, Indiana, U.S.

| alma_mater = University of Southern California (BA)
Johns Hopkins University (MFA)

| occupation = Novelist

}}

Ellen Akins is an American novelist from South Bend, Indiana.

Early life and education

After graduating from LaSalle Intermediate Academy in 1977, Akins earned a Bachelor of Arts in film production at the University of Southern California. As a young adult, Akins participated in Beyond Our Control, a youth-produced community television program.{{Cite web|title=Ellen Akins|url=http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1273933/|website=IMDb|access-date=2020-05-05}}{{better source needed|date=July 2024}}

Career

Akins worked with film producer Sydney Pollack before losing interest in the film business. Akins then earned a Master of Fine Arts in the creative writing program at Johns Hopkins University.{{Cite web|title=Ellen Akins {{!}} The Loft Literary Center|url=https://loft.org/artists/ellen-akins|website=loft.org|access-date=2020-05-05}} In April 1993, she was awarded the Academy Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters for her fiction writing;{{cite news|title=Intense, Urgent Novel Skewers Politics|last=Gillespie|first=Mary|date=23 May 1993|work=Chicago Sun-Times}} she has also been given grants by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ingram Merrill Foundation,{{cite news|last=Hughes|first=Andrew S.|date=August 27, 1998|title=Hometown Brewed: South Bend native and author Ellen Akins has built a critical reputation book by book|work=South Bend Tribune}} and won the Whiting Award in 1989.{{cite news|title=10 Get Awards for Writers|last=McDowell|first=Edwin|date=27 October 1989|work=The New York Times}}

Akins is the author of five books; the novels Home Movie, published in 1988 by Simon & Schuster,{{cite news|title=California Dreams and Obsessions|last=Prose|first=Francine|date=20 November 1988|newspaper=The Washington Post}} Little Woman, published in 1990 by Harper & Row,{{cite news|work=The San Diego Union-Tribune|title=Complicated characters mar 'Little Woman'|last=Winders|first=Glenda|date=July 22, 1990}} Public Life, published in 1993 by HarperCollins, and Hometown Brew, published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1998, and the short story collection "World Like a Knife", published in 1991 by Johns Hopkins University Press. Akins has also taught at Western Michigan University, Northland College, and Fairleigh Dickinson University.{{cite web |url=http://www.cheqnet.net/~emakins/EllenAkins.html |title=Ellen Akins |publisher=Cheqtel Communications |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090829232008/http://www.cheqnet.net/~emakins/EllenAkins.html |archive-date=2009-08-29 }}

Personal life

Akins lives in Cornucopia, Wisconsin.{{Cite web |date=2006-02-06 |title=Fiction Writer Ellen Akins to read for Writing Program Reading Series Feb. 16 |url=https://source.wustl.edu/2006/02/fiction-writer-ellen-akins-to-read-for-writing-program-reading-series-feb-16/ |access-date=2020-05-05 |website=Washington University in St. Louis |language=en-US}}

Awards

1989 Whiting Award
1993 Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters

Works

= Books =

{{cite book |date=1988 |title=Home Movie |url=https://archive.org/details/homemovienovel00akin|url-access=registration |publisher=Simon & Schuster |isbn=978-0-67166-135-9 }}
{{cite book |date=1990 |title=Little Woman |url=https://archive.org/details/littlewoman00elle |publisher=Harpercollins |isbn=978-0-06016-362-4 }}
{{cite book |date=1991 |title=World Like a Knife |url=https://archive.org/details/worldlikeknife00akin |publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press |isbn=978-0-80184-288-7 }}
{{cite book |date=1993 |title=Public Life |url=https://archive.org/details/publiclife00akin |publisher=Harpercollins |isbn=978-0-06016-753-0 }}
{{cite book |date=1998 |title=Hometown Brew |url=https://archive.org/details/hometownbrewnove00akin |publisher=Knopf |isbn=978-0-67944-795-5 }}

= Stories =

{{cite journal |date=1985 |title=Something You Won't Understand |journal=The Southern Review |volume=Winter |publisher=LSU Press }}{{Cite web|url=http://thesouthernreview.org/issues/detail/Winter-1985/53/|title = The Southern Review : Issue: Winter 1985}}
{{cite journal |date=1991 |title=Nobody's Baby |journal=The Southern Review |volume=Autumn |publisher=LSU Press }}{{Cite web|url=http://thesouthernreview.org/issues/detail/Autumn-1991/80/|title = The Southern Review : Issue: Autumn 1991}}
{{Cite web |url=http://www.perigee-art.com/0709/index-3.php |date=2009 |title=A Modest Appetite |publisher=Perigree: Publication for the Arts |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121028083233/http://www.perigee-art.com/0709/index-3.php |archive-date= 28 October 2012}}
{{cite journal |date=Fall 2010 |title=Her Delivery |url=http://www.servinghousejournal.com/AkinsDelivery.aspx |journal=Serving House Journal |issue=2 }}