Bonnie Jo Campbell has led a life like a tall tale.
The six-foot, blonde Michigander has worked for Ringling Brothers’ Circus, earned a black belt in Kouburyu karate, and, before devoting her efforts to fiction, received a master’s degree in mathematics. She has led bike tours across Russia, raised more than one horse, and, most recently, received a nomination for the National Book Award for American Salvage, her second collection of short stories.
Following the cue of her first collection (Women and Other Animals) and her debut novel (Q Road), American Salvage deals with a rural Michigan of methamphetamine, unemployment, and millennial paranoia. Campbell’s characters are larger-than-life scrabblers whose love, fear, and devotion is rendered achingly throughout her work.
