I have been writing since childhood and discovering happiness through many sorts of writing—although I find myself often focusing on what may destroy happiness as my characters struggle to create better lives for themselves and others. In The Withers, I imagined a world surviving a disaster that led to organ failure among the genetically predisposed. My character Riatta, financially destitute and afflicted with mysterious bodily markings known as withers, is a survivor who, along with her friend Diana, another woman with withers, attempts to find some measure of happiness even while she is shunned by those unmarked who wish to forget the circumstances that led to many lives being lost. A novel about friendship, obsession, guilt, betrayal, profound loss, and the lure of forgetting, The Withers asks questions about how self-trust can be reclaimed even in the most horrifying circumstances.
My 2024 novel, Tabitha, Get Up, might seem like a wildly different piece of work. It’s a comic novel about a woman who attempts to regain her self-respect by writing two biographies simultaneously: one about a celebrity so handsome his face is on the side of buses, another about an author of erotica with a fanatical cult following. But like The Withers, my comic novel also asks serious questions about friendship and self-trust and how to survive in precarious environments.
I am a multi-genre author, not because I’m polygamous when it comes to genre, but because each genre is addictive and possibly a bit contagious. Along with The Withers and Tabitha, Get Up, I’ve written seven collections of poetry, two short story collections, a novella, four books of literary criticism, and an essay collection. My poetry has appeared widely, including in The New Yorker, Poetry, and Southern Review, as well as three editions of Best American Poetry. I am the recipient of the Pushcart Prize, Poetry Society of America awards, the Miami University Novella Prize, the Saturnalia Book Prize, and other honors. For over three decades I taught at Lafayette College, where I assumed the title Francis A. March Professor Emerita of English and Writer in Residence when I stepped away from teaching to write full time.
I am the deeply proud mother of two adult daughters. I live in Easton, Pennsylvania, with my wonderful husband, our faithful cat Krissie, and our sturdy pet rabbit Mellow Tai Tai, who turned up abandoned on our driveway and now, with Krissie, benevolently rules the household.
www.leeupton.com
Regal House Publishing is proud to bring you Lee Upton’s The Withers in 2026.
