NMU Professor's Book Signing

A Northern Michigan University professor has recently had a new book published.

And he held a book signing at the Peter White Public Library Thursday night.

John Smolens has taught in NMU’s English department since 1996.

His new fictional novel, “Quarantine”, was just published in September.

It’s his ninth book, and it’s about a fever that infects a coastal town in Massachusetts in 1796.

Smolens read some selections from “Quarantine”.

He finds early America fascinating; Smolens once lived for about a decade in Newburyport, Massachusetts, where “Quarantine” is set.

He says he used to work on homes in that town, many of which were built in the same time period as the setting of the story, and he’s always had a feeling for that period of history.

Some of Smolens’s works have been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award.

He also held a public reading and signing at the library in January for his most recent previous work, “The Schoolmaster’s Daughter”.