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Kristin A. Oakley

Born: 1961 in Madison, Wisconsin
Pen Name: None

Connection to Illinois: I lived in Freeport, Illinois for over ten years. As a homeschooling activist, I unschooled my two daughters and founded the ''Stephenson County HOUSE'' homeschool group (later called ''Northwest Illinois HOUSE''). I started my professional writing career in Freeport writing a monthly column for the ''Freeport iNK''. After living in Europe, we moved back to Freeport and eventually Rockford, Illinois. While in Rockford I was a co-founder and the first president of the professional writers' organization In Print which is an affiliate of the ''Chicago Writers Association'' of which I'm currently a board member. My debut novel ''Carpe Diem, Illinois'' takes place in a fictional town in northwestern Wisconsin. Much of the book is also set in Chicago.

Biography: Kristin A. Oakley is a founding member and past president of ''In Print'', a professional writers' organization in the Rockford, Illinois area and a board member of the ''Chicago Writers Association''. As a writing instructor at the UW-Madison Division of Continuing Studies, Kristin critiques manuscripts and offers an online course on cliffhangers. Kristin was an editorial columnist for the Freeport, Illinois newspaper, ''the iNK''; wrote editorials in the ''Freeport Journal Standard'' and ''Rockford Register Star''; and penned articles for ''Home Education Magazine''. She has a B.A. in psychology and a J.D., both from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Kristin’s debut novel, ''Carpe Diem, Illinois'', was published in April of 2014 through Little Creek Press. She’s currently writing the sequel, ''God on Mayhem Street'', and is playing around with the idea for a science fiction novel.


Awards:

Primary Literary Genre(s): Fiction

Primary Audience(s): Adult readers

Email: kristinoakley@outlook.com
Website: http://www.kristinoakley.net/
Kristin A. Oakley on WorldCat : http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=kristin+a.+oakley


Selected Titles

Carpe diem, Illinois :
ISBN: 0989978036 OCLC: 876666697

Little Creek Press, Mineral Point, WI : 2014.

"For decades, the small town of Carpe Diem, Illinois has quietly unschooled its children, eschewing tests and classrooms for real-life experiences. Now, long-smoldering political feuds--and deep personal secrets--threaten to explode. When her mother is hospitalized in Carpe Diem after an auto accident, teenager Tali Shaw, the daughter of a powerful state senator, finds herself at the heart of a vicious conspiracy to bring Carpe Diem down. Can prize-winning Chicago Examiner reporter Leo Townsend overcome his own demons and expose those behind the scheme before it's too late? And when the truth is finally revealed, can Carpe Diem ever be the same?"--Page 4 of cover.

 

 

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