born Feb. 16, 1944, Jackson, Miss., U.S.
U.S. novelist and short-story writer.
His first novel, A Piece of My Heart (1976), showed the influence of William Faulkner . The Sportswriter (1986) and its sequel, Independence Day (1995, Pulitzer Prize), drew on his experience as a writer for a sports magazine in the 1980s. His story collection Rock Springs (1987) examines the lives of the lonely and alienated.