Heather Newton’s novel Under The Mercy Trees (HarperCollins 2011) won the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award, was chosen by the Women’s National Book Association as a Great Group Reads Selection and named an “Okra Pick” by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance. Her short story collection McMullen Circle (Regal House 2022) was the finalist for the W.S. Porter prize. Her novel The Puppeteer’s Daughters (Turner Publishing 2022) has been optioned for television. A practicing attorney, she teaches creative writing for UNC-Asheville’s Great Smokies Writing Program and is co-founder of the Flatiron Writers Room in Asheville.