Marian Szczepanski

The granddaughter of immigrant coal miners, Marian Szczepanski grew up in southwestern Pennsylvania and lived as a young child in the Jamison Coal Company house where her mother and aunts were raised. Curiosity about her grandmothers' lives led Marian to write her debut novel Playing St. Barbara.

A saint in a coal mine? Absolutely. To this day, mines throughout the world display an image of St. Barbara, patroness of miners. After Marian read the saint's 7th century legend, the novel's plot began to take shape. A coal patch's annual pageant would reenact St. Barbara's life, and every girl in town would covet the lead role. After completing the first draft, Marian realized the lives of her four main characters bore an eerie resemblance to that of the legendary saint--except the legend's ending.

Marian has won awards for short fiction and magazine feature writing and holds an MFA in fiction from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and a BA in American Studies from the University of Notre Dame. She lives in Houston, Texas, and teaches creative writing workshops at Writespace (Houston) and Gemini Ink (San Antonio), as well as out-of-state writing centers, conferences, and colleges/universities.