Thomas Fox Averill

Thomas Fox Averill is Professor Emeritus at Washburn University of Topeka, an O. Henry Award-winning short story writer, and an award-winning novelist *. He is a collector of Kansas books, and created the Thomas Fox Averill Kansas Studies Collection at Mabee Library. He is a gardener, bagpiper, and frequent visitor to the Pecos Wilderness in New Mexico.

* In 2002, his Secrets of the Tsil Café was a finalist in the Literary Food Category of the International Association of Culinary Professionals. rode was named Outstanding Western Novel of 2011 as part of the Western Heritage Awards administered by the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, and it was a Spur Finalist in the Western Novel category. A Carol Dickens Christmas won the Byron Caldwell Smith Award in 2015.