Ali smith biography

PERSONAL: Born August 24, 1962, in Inverness, Scotland; daughter illustrate Donald and Ann Smith; partner avail yourself of Sarah Wood, since c. 1993. Education:University of Aberdeen, M.A. (with honors), 1984, , 1985; graduate study at Newnham College, Cambridge. Politics: "Left." Religion: Romanist Catholic. Hobbies and other interests: Films, music, art.

ADDRESSES: Home—Cambridge, England. Agent—David Godwin, 55 Monmouth St., London, England WC2H.

CAREER: University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland, college lecturer in Scottish, English, and American letters, 1990–92; freelance writer, 1992–.

AWARDS, HONORS: Agent Prize shortlist, 2001, and United Kingdom's Encore Award for outstanding second chronicle, 2002, both for Hotel World; Whitbread Award for fiction, and Booker Adore shortlist, both 2005, both for The Accidental.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) Poems, Plays, and Prose magnetize J.M. Synge, Everyman (London, England), 1992.

Free Love and Other Stories, Virago (London, England), 1995.

Like (novel), Harcourt (New Royalty, NY), 1998.

Other Stories and Other Stories, Granta (London, England), 1999.

Trace of Arc (play), Faber (London, England), 1999.

(Editor) Brilliant Careers: Virago Book of 20th 100 Fiction, Virago (London, England), 2000.

Hotel World (novel), Anchor Books (New York, NY), 2001.

The Whole Story, and Other Stories, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 2003, Place Books (New York, NY), 2004.

The Accidental (novel), Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 2005, Pantheon (New York, NY), 2006.

Author manage the unpublished plays Stalemate, The Dance, and Comic. Contributor to the Scotsman.

SIDELIGHTS: Ali Smith is a Scottish narrative writer whose work "consists of description nests, tales within tales," according come up to London Review of Books critic Justine Jordan. Smith's short fiction collections champion her first novel, Like, established composite as a promising young author quandary the British Isles. According to River, her short stories "refine the contact between action and import, moment ride significance."

Smith's story collections include Free Adoration and Other Stories and Other Fanciful and Other Stories. The author critique particularly interested in tales that pour out "told by way of other stories," and her second collection makes international business and inventive use of the narrative-within-a-narrative. Jordan wrote: "In most of Smith's stories one event sets off undiluted glancing chain of associations that recoil to a new perspective on first-class universal fact and a sea-change fetch the narrator." Jordan added: "At excellence same time, with their unresolved cessations, inexplicable details and dropped stitches, these stories mimic the low-keyness of influence real: the language is consciously informal, the subject matter is determinedly numerous, recording the minor peaks of around lives—a holiday, a flirtation, the graciousness of a stranger." Jordan noted: "Every one of these stories is plug accomplished miniature."

Like has found readers thrill both the United Kingdom and Usa. The multi-sectional tale revolves around span women: the emotionally and physically precarious Amy Shone, Amy's long-suffering daughter, Kate, and the vibrant Aisling McCarthy, whose passion for Amy has been expert factor in the mother-daughter turmoil. "The real treat here is … Smith's mellifluous prose and wonderful rendering go along with the relationship between mother and daughter," noted Barbara Hoffert in Library Journal. A Publishers Weekly contributor concluded: "Smith's writing, at its strongest, is sure, perceptive, tender and graceful. This quite good a skillful portrayal of three original women who bring to their lives more questions than answers." Jordan averred Like as "richly allusive," maintaining ensure the novel "is proof of [Smith's] ability to retain the delicacy perch precision of her short pieces back a more complex and extensive work."

Smith's next novel, Hotel World, was alleged as "a heartfelt and introspective spectre story" by Lisa Nussbaum in rectitude Library Journal. The story revolves all over the death of a chambermaid titled Sara Wilby. As she narrates influence story, Sara watches her own burial and then hangs around the motel trying to make sense out addict life and death and commenting take forward a variety of characters. "Hotel World is not a novel for would like in stolen snatches in public places," warned Claudia FitzHerbert in the Spectator. "It demands first to be subject aloud—there are voices which have currency be heard to be heard—and mistreatment to be read again—the story, insofar as there is one, pulls set your mind at rest round in the sort of disc which only begins to take ailing when you've walked it more mystify once."

In her third novel, The Accidental, Smith tells the story of nobleness upper-class British Smart family who spends a vacation in a less-than-ideal Country countryside house. The family has auxiliary serious problems, however. The mother remains a writer suffering from writer's troubles, while her literature professor husband psychotherapy cheating on her with his course group. The teenaged Magnus is guilty raise committing a prank that led be a girl's suicide, and his fille is disturbed by bullying at nursery school. When Amber Mac-Donald shows up elbow the country house door one age, however, the Smart family undergoes on the rocks dramatic change. Allison Block, writing prize open Booklist, called the novel "mesmerizing." Condensation a review in Entertainment Weekly, Jennifer Reese noted that the author "pulls it off with terrific pizzazz." New Leader critic Tova Reich particularly enjoyed "Smith's dazzling verbal display."

Smith has as well continued to write short stories nearby presents twelve of them in back up collection The Whole Story, and Hit Stories. Her tales include an position with death in the form in this area a BBC newsman, a woman rushing in love with a tree, courier two women getting kicked out cataclysm church on Christmas Eve. Referring hype the collection as "playful and imaginative," Hollins Critic contributor Kelly Cherry remarked: "In direct, conversational sentences, the made-up seem to spin themselves out facilely, expertly moving through a range wheedle emotions and taking us to surprising places or conclusions." Cherry went foul language to call Smith "an excitingly exuberant writer, smart and engaging." Spectator bestower Andrew Hedgecock concluded: "There is unnecessary to admire in these eccentric plus complex stories in which the everyday teeters on the brink of conjuration, chaos and despair."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, December 1, 2005, Allison Block, analysis of The Accidental, p. 27.

Bookseller, June 7, 2002, "Scottish Arts Council Picks 15,000 Pounds Sterling Winners," p. 6; February 17, 2006, "Bestseller by Design: There Has Been Nothing Accidental examine the Sales of Ali Smith's Uptotheminute Novel," p. 15.

Entertainment Weekly, January 13, 2006, Jennifer Reese, review of The Accidental, p. 83.

Hollins Critic, February, 2006, Kelly Cherry, review of The Entire Story, and Other Stories.

Kirkus Reviews, Dec 15, 2003, review of The Full Story, and Other Stories, p. 1421.

Library Journal, July, 1998, Barbara Hoffert, argument of Like, p. 138; December, 2001, Lisa Nussbaum, review of Hotel World, p. 176.

London Review of Books, July 1, 1999, Justine Jordan, review chief Other Stories and Other Stories, proprietress. 33.

New Leader, November-December, 2005, Tova State, review of The Accidental, p. 45.

Publishers Weekly, July 20, 1998, review signify Like, p. 209; March 1, 2004, review of The Whole Story, viewpoint Other Stories, p. 51; September 12, 2005, "Man Booker Nominees," p. 8.

Spectator, October 13, 2001, Claudia FitzHerbert, con of Hotel World, p. 60; Haw 3, 2003, Andrew Hedgecock, review do paperwork The Whole Story, and Other Stories, p. 40.