John Hewitt book signing and reading scheduled at UAF
December 4, 2013
Marmian Grimes
907-474-7902
12/4/2013
Fairbanks author John Hewitt will hold a book signing and reading at 6 p.m. Dec. 6, at the Murie Building Auditorium on the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus.
Hewitt will sign copies of his recently released collection of short stories, “The Model 12 Winchester as a Way of Life,” and his eldest son, Tom Hewitt, will read two selections from the book. The event is sponsored by UAF's Office of Public History and the Northern Studies program.
Hewitt majored in English in college, on his way to a commission in the Marine Corps in time for the Vietnam War. Tom Hewitt says his father was still a second lieutenant when he got his head blown in by a hand grenade and was sent to the hospital for five months. He received his medical retirement three months after enrolling in graduate school for creative writing in Alaska.
He finished graduate school prepared to teach English in high school. But high school started at the exact same time as duck season. So he became a laborer and a carpenter, with duck seasons off. Which led to his contention that, “I am a duck hunter. Everything else I just fake …”
Hewitt wrote for Gray’s Sporting Journal for 31 years, until a stroke retired him from writing. “The Model 12 Winchester as a Way of Life” is a collection of hunting and fishing stories he wrote for Gray's, arranged in chronological order. The stories also chronicle his years growing up in Kansas. See more about the book at www.hoppercreekpress.com.
ADDITIONAL CONTACT: Tom Hewitt, 907-347-8702, hypernova@mac.com
DC/12-4-13/145-14