Ron Rash (born 1953), an American poet, short story writer and novelist, is the Parris Distinguished Professor in Appalachian Cultural Studies at Western Carolina University. Rash was born in Chester, South Carolina, in 1953, grew up in Boiling Springs, North Carolina, and is a graduate of Gardner-Webb University and Clemson University. In 1994 he published his first book, a collection of short stories titled The Night the New Jesus Fell to Earth. Since then, Rash has published three collections of poetry, three short story collections, and four novels, all to wide critical acclaim and several awards and honors. Rash's poems and stories have appeared in more than 100 magazines and journals over the years. With each new book, Rash has confirmed his position as a central and significant Appalachian writer alongside well-established names like Fred Chappell, Lee Smith, and Robert Morgan. Serena, Rash's latest release, has received favorable reviews nationwide and was a 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award Finalist.
interweaves his family's personal migration from Buncombe County, NC farms with the broader portrait of mill life outside Chester, South Carolina
Among the Believers (2000)
Raising the Dead (2002)
Deals with loss and displacement as a result of the flooding of Jocassee Valley, S.C.
Short story collections
The Night The New Jesus Fell to Earth and Other Stories from Cliffside, North Carolina (1994)
Casualties (2000)
Chemistry and Other Stories (2007)
Thirteen short stories, eight of which were previously published in Casualties ("Chemistry," "Last Rite," "Not Waving But Drowning," "Overtime," "Cold Harbor", "Honesty", "Dangerous Love," "The Projectionist's Wife,"). Also includes the O. Henry Prize Winner "Speckled Trout" as well as "Pemberton's Bride," a story that gives a taste of Rash's forthcoming novel.
Burning Bright (2010)
Novels
One Foot in Eden (2002)
Fleshes out the characters and themes of Raising the Dead. It tells the story of a community displaced disguised as a murder mystery and imbued with Rash’s poetic language.
Saints at the River (2004)
About a South Carolina community torn over the issue of environmentalism.
The World Made Straight (2006)
Both a coming-of-age story set in the 1970s Appalachia and a meditation on the role of the past in the present, in this case a Civil War massacre that has divided Madison County, N.C. ever since.
Serena (2008)
The ambitious wife of a North Carolina timber baron, Serena brings the spirit of Lady MacBeth to depression-era North Carolina.
Children's book
The Shark’s Tooth (2001)
Magazine Publications
The Woman at the Pond (The Southern Review, Vol. 46.4, 2010)