<p><b>Keith Maillard</b> is the author of thirteen novels, including <i>Two Strand River</i>, <i>Alex Driving South</i>, <i>Motet</i>, <i>Hazard Zones</i>, <i>Gloria</i>, <i>The Clarinet Polka</i>, and <i>Difficulty at the Beginning</i>, his four-volume Bildungsroman. He has won the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize (<i>Motet</i>) and was shortlisted for both the Commonwealth Literary Prize (<i>Hazard Zones</i>) and the Governor General's Literary Awards (<i>Gloria</i>). <i>The Clarinet Polka</i> was awarded the Creative Arts Prize by the Polish American Historical Association. His poetry collection, <i>Dementia Americana</i>, won the Gerald Lampert Award in 1995 for the Best First Book of Poetry Published in Canada.</p><p>Keith was born and raised in Wheeling, West Virginia, the inspiration for the fictional town of Raysburg, which serves as the setting for many of his novels. He has been a musician, a contributor for CBC Radio, a freelance photographer and journalist, and a designer of distance education courses. His reviews, essays, and poems have appeared in many journals, ranging from <i>Event</i> to <i>Flare</i>. He lives in West Vancouver with his wife and two daughters and teaches in the Creative Writing Program at the University of British Columbia.</p>