Tom Franklin Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Story Collections

Publication Order of Anthologies

Thomas Gerald Franklin, commonly known as Tom Franklin, is a renowned American crime fiction writer from Alabama. Tom Franklin was born on July 7, 1963, in a small town known as Dickinson in southern Alabama. The population of this town is comprised of half-black and half-white. While he was young, Tom Franklin attended Dickinson Baptist church for a short time. Franklin grew up in a family of the hunter, but he was non-hunter. From his childhood, Franklin loved writing, reading, and drawing. In fact, he became the first member of his family to get a decent education.

In 1981, Franklin moved to Mobile, Alabama with his family where his father opened a mechanic shop there. Later, he attended the University of South Alabama for undergraduate education where he earned a BA in English. While in the university, Franklin got bad grades that prompted his father to stop paying fees for him. From then, he worked various places on the night to raise fees for his education. He was employed as a machine operator at a sandblasting grit plant. Also, Franklin worked at a chemical plant as a construction inspector. Surprisingly, he even secured a job in the morgue as a clerk. Furthermore, Franklin spent some years working at a chemical plant where he was employed to clean hazardous waste.

Although he worked on tough jobs, Franklin managed to pay tuition fees and discovered his creative writing talent. In his late twenties, he finished BA and started his MA. He then started tutoring and the university’s writing lab. After then he got a teaching job at Selma university- an all-black Baptist college. He was neither Baptist nor Baptist and he the only white student on the campus. Then he taught six classes in a semester. After then, he finished his comprehensive exams for his MA exams including the thesis which featured a short story collection. Also, he worked on his foreign proficiency exam. In 1988, Tom Franklin graduated from the university and earned an MA in fiction.

He started publishing few short stories in which he was awarded a prize in Playboy College Fiction Contest in 1991. This prompted to pursue a career in writing. He applied for several MFA programs where he became lucky to join the University of Arkansas. At the university, he met his wife, Ann Fennelly who is a poet. They got married after completion of their four-year program. Around the same time, he sold his first two books, the Idea Hell at the Breech and the Poachers, to William Morrow. In the first year of their marriage, they lived apart. He decided to move to Galesburg, Illinois where her wife was teaching a Knox college. That year, he won the Philip Roth Residency at Bucknell University at Lewisburg in Pennsylvania. He only stayed there for one semester before moving to Knox College where he became a visiting Writing-in-Residence.

In 2000, Franklin went to Oxford Mississippi where he became the John and Renee Grisham Writer-in-Residence. There he taught fiction writing a course to both graduate and undergraduate students for two semesters. Franklin and his wife maintained a house in Oxford where she was a member of English Department. In 2001, Franklin won a Guggenheim Fellowship and started teaching at Sewanee for the academic year 2002-2003.

As a writer, Franklin has become very successful. His essays and short stories have been published in many magazines including Nebraska Review, Brightleaf, The Chattahoochee, The Texas Review, Smoke Magazine, and Quarterly West, and much other. Moreover, his writing has been published in anthologies such as The year’s Best, New Stories from the South, Best American Mystery Stories and Best Mystery stories of the century.

To date, Franklin has published four novels. In 1999, The William Morrow published his first novel, Poachers. This is a collection of short stories that were set in Alabama. This novel received Edgar Allan Poe Award as the Best Mystery story. The Poachers is set to be translated to British, Japanese, French, and German Versions. Another book is Hell at The Breech, which was published in 2003. The story was published by Harper Collins and is set in Alabama in Clarke County. This story talks about the feud that occurred in 1899.

In 2006, he published his third novel called Smonk. This is a tale about a rapist who terrorized Alabama. This rapist murdered his victims for many years but was later apprehended in 1911. In 2010, Tom Franklin published a novel known as the Crooked Letter. This novel won the crime Writer’s Association Gold Dagger Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. In 2013, Tom Franklin co-authored the novel entitled The Titled World with his wife.

Together with wife, Tom Franklin now has three children. Fennelly, who is a poet, published her first book in 2001. This book, known as Open House, received the Kenyon Review Prize in 2001. In fact, this is the most prestigious award any author could receive. Moreover, Franklin’s wife also received the Texas Review Poetry chapbook Competition in 1997. Franklin’s wife who was an assistant professor of English at the Knox College in Illinois is now at the University of Mississippi. There she works as poetry and literary studies professor.

On the other hand, Tom Franklin is currently teaching as an associate Professor of Fiction at the University of Mississippi. He is currently teaching under MFA program. He and his wife now teach the MFA program at the University of Mississippi.

When it comes to Awards, Tom Franklin has been honored many times. On top of the Edgar Allan Poe award, Tom Franklin has been honored won many other awards. In 1998, Franklin was awarded in the Writers at Work Literary Non-fiction contest. In the same year, he was awarded the Arkansas Arts Council Grant for the Short Story. Franklin also received the 2001 Guggenheim Fellowship Award. Moreover, he received the John and Renee Grisham Writer-in-Residence for 2001-2002 Academic year.

In conclusion, Tom Franklin is an outstanding American fiction writer who has touched the lives of many people. In fact, many readers across the globe love the way in which Franklin narrate the stories in the novel. Moreover, Franklin’s wife has played a crucial role in the success of his fiction writing career.