I was born and raised in Charleston County, South Carolina and can trace multiple branches of my family tree back to the late 1700s in the Lowcountry. My ancestry is heavily populated with farmers and fisherman. As a young girl I’d spend hours in the woods, fields, and along creekbanks, and my writing reflects my deep connection to and love of the lush wildness of coastal South Carolina that seems a part of my DNA. The limitless mystery and beauty of the natural world ignite my writing.
My new novel, Fig Days, set on Wadmalaw Island, South Carolina, is an homage to my family’s deep roots in our beloved Lowcountry but also my effort at a reckoning with the region’s ragged past. It’s a story involving complex family dynamics with shadows of past trauma, themes of redemption and atonement and the search for truth. The novel is peppered throughout with some crabbing, fishing, farming, and boating with a dash of porch sitting for good measure.
I graduated from Clemson University (GO TIGERS!) with a degree in English and a minor in political science. Upon graduation I spent a season in the Rocky Mountains waiting tables and working the switchboard at a hotel so I could ski, hike, bike, and camp on days off, all the while stockpiling experiences that would later feed my fiction writing. After returning to the South, I obtained my teaching certificate and then a M.Ed. from Converse College. I’ve coached varsity girls basketball and taught every grade from 7th through college classes and was named a Rookie Teacher of the Year for a public school district my first year after grad school.
My previous novels are Border Child and The Iguana Tree. My work has been favorably reviewed by The San Francisco Chronicle, The New Yorker, The Atlanta Journal Constitution, The Charlotte Observer, Kirkus (starred review) and many others. I’m the winner of the Mary Frances Hobson Prize for Distinguished Achievement in Arts and Letters, the Patricia Winn Award for Southern Literature, and the South Carolina Fiction Award. I am a past board chair of the Hub City Writers Project and currently serve on the board of trustees of Converse University as well as Spartanburg Day School. My husband Eliot and I enjoy hiking and being outside. Over nine days in the winter of 2023 we trekked to the top (and back down) of Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania with our son and two daughters.
Regal House Publishing is delighted to bring you Michel Stone’s Fig Days in the spring of 2027.
