Success Is No Mystery to Novelist Haines
It was the early 1940s. FDR was in the White House, Glenn Miller and Tommy Dorsey ruled the radio, and Uncle Sam was looking for heroes to take on Hitler. Sugar and gasoline may have been in short supply, but pluck and patriotism were at an all-time high. This is the lively backdrop for Kathryn Miller Haines’s first novel, The War Against Miss Winter, published by HarperCollins earlier this month. The School of Arts and Sciences alumna uses place and time to the fullest advantage to tell the riveting story of Rosie Winter, an aspiring actress turned reluctant detective who finds herself squarely in the center of a Manhattan murder mystery.
About Haines
The subject matter provides a creative confluence for Haines (A&S ’98), who, in addition to writing fiction, is an accomplished actor, award-winning playwright, and artistic director of Mystery’s Most Wanted, a 12-year-old, five-person dinner-theater company based in Pittsburgh.
Though these days she is a master of mystery, Haines first turned to whodunits to help her solve a puzzle of her own.
“I was dreadful at plotting, and so I decided to start reading mysteries, a genre I knew depended on crisp, beautiful plots. It was only natural—after reading so many of them—that my next project would be a mystery.”
Haines started building her story-telling skills at Trinity University in San Antonio, where she completed her undergraduate degree in theater and English. She moved to Pittsburgh in 1994, was accepted to Pitt’s MFA program in 1995, and, for the next three years, honed her craft under the tutelage of Fiona Cheong, Catherine Gammon, and the late Richard Tobias.
The English department’s graduate writing program, which accepts only 21 students each year, is among the country’s oldest and most highly regarded. MFA candidates can choose from specializations in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.
Her Work at Pitt’s Center for American Music
In addition to being a Pitt alumna, Haines is a 12-year employee of the University. As associate director of the Center for American Music, Haines manages a library, archive, and museum “dedicated to expanding and documenting knowledge of American music and its role in American life.” The collection is rich in materials from the 19th and early 20th centuries, and Haines frequently is called upon to help scholars from all over the world with research questions. It is work that requires not only an appreciation of the past, but also the ability to string together clues like pearls on a chain.
“My favorite part of my job is being asked the impossible question. Nothing makes me happier than having to dig through our library to find a solution to a research puzzle. I suppose I’m like Rosie in that I possess a natural curiosity that makes me want to find solutions to problems that don’t seem to have easily identifiable answers.”
Order Her New Book
The War Against Miss Winter is available for purchase at mysterylovers.com. Also, look for the second novel in the series, due in 2008. Visit kathrynmillerhaines.com for more information.
Something to Write Home About
Though Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Chabon, who earned his undergraduate degree from Pitt in 1984, is undoubtedly the English department’s most famous alumnus, both the undergraduate and graduate writing programs have produced a significant number of talented and successful working writers. Recent achievements of current and former students include the following:
- Sam McDonald, a second-year MFA student, just sold his first book, The Urban Hermit: A Savage Escape from the Beast of the American Belly, to St. Martin’s Press.
- Lori Jakiela, an MFA alumna and an associate professor of English and director of the writing program at the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg, published her memoir, Miss New York Has Everything, with Warner Books in 2006.
- Priscilla Rodd had her MFA thesis Surviving Mae West, a novel, published by Vandalia Press in 2006.
- Lisa A. Phillips, who received her MFA in 1997, is the author of Public Radio: Behind the Voices, nonfiction profiles of public radio hosts, published by CDS Books/Perseus in 2006.
- Two MFA alumnae won 2007 Pushcart Prizes: Kristin Kovacic for her essay “A Short History of My Breath” and Katherin Karlin for her short story “Bye-Bye Larry.”