John Casey (fiction) received the National Book Award in 1989 for his second novel, Spartina. The Half-life of Happiness, his most recent novel, appeared in 1998. Testimony and Demeanor, a story collection, won the Friends of American Writers Award. Other awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship and, from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, a Mildred and Harold Strauss Living Award. He lives in Charlottesville and is a professor of English literature at the University of Virginia. [Main faculty page]