Kristen-Paige Madonia to Visit MHC

Martinsville, Virginia native Kristen-Paige Madonia will sign copies of her debut novel, Fingerprints of You, at Piedmont Arts on Sept. 21, in celebration of the book's August release.

"I'm thrilled to visit Martinsville in September," said Madonia. "Having grown up in town, the community shaped and inspired my love of literature and my commitment to becoming an author. One of the greatest joys of writing a book is being able to travel and connect with readers, and coming home to Martinsville to celebrate Fingerprints of You with my friends and family will certainly be a highlight of this experience."

A young adult literary novel published by Simon & Schuster, Fingerprints of You follows Lemon Williams, a teen raised buried in the shadow of her free-spirited mother. Lemon's childhood is spent on the move - dodging disasters and mastering the art of packing up apartments, of being the new kid, and of leaving the past behind.

But when Lemon begins her senior year at another new school, she realizes she's taken an inescapable part of their last life with them: she's pregnant. In an attempt to fill in the gaps of her history and to avoid repeating her mother's mistakes, she decides she must set things right by going in search of the father she's never met.

Madonia's short fiction has appeared in various anthologies and journals including Upstreet, New Orleans Review, American Fiction: Best Previously Unpublished Short Stories by Emerging Writers and Sycamore Review. She is the 2012 D.H. Lawrence Fellow and has received awards or residencies from the Hambidge Center, the Sewanee Writers' Conference, the Vermont Studio Center, Juniper Summer Writing Institute, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Hedgebrook Writers' Retreat, Millay Colony for the Arts, the Key West Literary Seminar, and the Studios of Key West. Madonia was a finalist for the 2011 Virginia Commission for the Arts Fellowship in Fiction, and in 2010 she was awarded the Tennessee Williams/New Orleans Literary Festival Prize. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from California State University, Long Beach and currently lives in Charlottesville, VA, where she teaches creative writing and is at work on her second novel.

Copies of Fingerprints of You will be available for purchase at Piedmont Arts during Madonia's book signing. Copies are also available at bookstores nationwide or online at www.simonandschuster.com.