Sandra Scofield is an American

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living wage, living writing novels and other fiction, while other ...

essay An essay ( ) is, generally, a piece of writing that gives the author's own argument, but the definition is vague, overlapping with those of a Letter (message), letter, a term paper, paper, an article (publishing), article, a pamphlet, and a s ...

ist, editor and author of writers’ guides.

Biography

Sandra Scofield was born to Edith Aileen Hambleton in

Wichita Falls, Texas Wichita Falls ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Wichita County, Texas, United States. It is the principal city of the Wichita Falls metropolitan area, Wichita Falls metropolitan statistical area, which encompasses all of Archer County, Tex ...

, in 1943. Scofield taught in public schools and colleges, but stopped working in 1983 to write full-time. Her first novel was ''Gringa'', based on her observations and experiences in 1960s

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. Since then she has published six more novels and a memoir, in addition to numerous book reviews, scholarly publications, and short stories. She occasionally teaches writing in summer workshops, visits MFA programs, has mentored individual writers, and has written a book for writers, ''The Scene Book'', published by

Penguin Penguins are a group of aquatic flightless birds from the family Spheniscidae () of the order Sphenisciformes (). They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere. Only one species, the Galápagos penguin, is equatorial, with a sm ...

in 2007. She is organizing letters written to her close friend Mary Economidy in the 1960s, and completing writing projects. She frequently reviews books for national newspapers including the ''

Dallas Morning News ''The Dallas Morning News'' is a daily newspaper serving the Dallas–Fort Worth area of Texas, with an average print circulation in 2022 of 65,369. It was founded on October 1, 1885, by Alfred Horatio Belo as a satellite publication of the ' ...

'', ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...

'', ''

Newsday ''Newsday'' is a daily newspaper in the United States primarily serving Nassau and Suffolk counties on Long Island, although it is also sold throughout the New York metropolitan area. The slogan of the newspaper is "Newsday, Your Eye on LI" ...

'', and ''

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

''.

Awards

Her awards include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship (1991); ''Beyond Deserving'' was a 1991 finalist for a

National Book Award The National Book Awards (NBA) are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. ...

; and ''A Chance to See Egypt'' received the Best Fiction award from the

Texas Institute of Letters The Texas Institute of Letters is a non-profit Honor Society founded by William Harvey Vann in 1936 to celebrate Texas literature and to recognize distinctive literary achievement. The TIL’s elected membership consists of the state’s most resp ...

in 1996.

Bibliography

Novels and other fiction

*''Gringa''. Sag Harbor, NY: Permanent Press, 1989. *''Beyond Deserving''. Sag Harbor, NY: Permanent Press, 1991. *''Walking Dunes''. Sag Harbor, NY: Permanent Press, 1992. *''More Than Allies''. Sag Harbor, NY: Permanent Press, 1993. *''Opal on Dry Ground''. New York: Villard Books, 1994. *''A Chance to See Egypt''. New York: HarperCollins, 1996. *''Plain Seeing''. New York: Cliff Street Books, 1997. *''Swim: Stories of the Sixties''. Ashland, OR: Wellstone Press, 2017.

Essays, compilations and memoirs

*''Occasions of Sin: a Memoir''. New York: Norton, 2004. *''The Scene Book: A Primer for the Fiction Writer''. New York: Penguin Books, 2007.
*''Children of the Dust: an Okie Family Story'' (ed.) by Betty Grant Henshaw. Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2006. *''Mysteries of Love and Grief: Reflections on a Plainswoman's Life''. Texas University Press, 2015. *''The Last Draft: A Novelist's Guide to Revision''. New York: Penguin Books, 2017.

References

External links

Author’s own site with bio, blurbs, excerpts and links (Archived from February 24, 2009)

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20080828045243/http://www.thesquaretable.com/Summer2004/motherhair.htm Excerpt from ''Occasions of Sin'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Scofield, Sandra 20th-century American novelists American women novelists Novelists from Texas Living people American women essayists 20th-century American women writers 20th-century American essayists American Book Award winners Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American women