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Craig Lancaster

Goodreads Author

Born

in Lakewood, Washington, The United States

Website

http://www.craig-lancaster.com/

Genre

Literature & Fiction

Influences

Steinbeck, Hemingway, Stegner, Doig -- a good, solid grounding in lite ...more

Member Since

September 2009

URL

https://www.goodreads.com/craig_lancaster

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When Craig Lancaster moved to Montana in 2006, at the age of 36, it was the realization of a dream he’d harbored since childhood, one that he figured had been overtaken by events, as so many dreams are.

“I have these incredibly vivid memories of visiting Montana with my folks on family vacations, and following my dad, an itinerant laborer who worked in the oil and gas fields of the West when I was a kid,” Lancaster says. “It was such a vast, beautiful, overwhelming place. From the first time I saw Montana, I wanted to be a part of it.”

Craig was born on February 9th, 1970, in Lakewood, Washington. Adopted at birth, he grew up in suburban Fort Worth, Texas, with his mother and stepfather and siblings. His stepfather, Charles Clines, was a long When Craig Lancaster moved to Montana in 2006, at the age of 36, it was the realization of a dream he’d harbored since childhood, one that he figured had been overtaken by events, as so many dreams are.

“I have these incredibly vivid memories of visiting Montana with my folks on family vacations, and following my dad, an itinerant laborer who worked in the oil and gas fields of the West when I was a kid,” Lancaster says. “It was such a vast, beautiful, overwhelming place. From the first time I saw Montana, I wanted to be a part of it.”

Craig was born on February 9th, 1970, in Lakewood, Washington. Adopted at birth, he grew up in suburban Fort Worth, Texas, with his mother and stepfather and siblings. His stepfather, Charles Clines, was a longtime sportswriter at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, a connection that led to Craig’s career as a journalist, a profession he followed to a series of newspaper jobs across the country — Texas, Alaska, Kentucky, Ohio, Washington, California and, finally, Montana.

A couple of years after Craig’s arrival in the Big Sky State, he began chasing another long-held dream: that of writing novels. His first completed novel, 600 Hours of Edward, was born in the crucible of National Novel Writing Month, that every-November free-for-all of furious writing. He completed an entire first draft, nearly 80,000 words, in November 2008. In October 2009, it was published by Riverbend Publishing of Helena, Montana, and has since gone on to be selected as a Montana Honor Book and a High Plains Book Award winner.

His follow-up, The Summer Son, was released in January 2011 by AmazonEncore, to similar acclaim. Booklist called the new novel “a classic western tale of rough lives and gruff, dangerous men, of innocence betrayed and long, stumbling journeys to love.”

Lancaster’s work delves deeply below the surface of its characters, teasing out the desires and motivations that lead us through our lives.

“It’s all too easy to turn people into caricatures, but the truth is, we humans are pretty damned fascinating,” he says. “For me, fiction is a way at getting at truth. I use it to examine the world around me, the things that disturb me, the questions I have about life — whether my own or someone else’s. My hope is that someone reading my work will have their own emotional experience and bring their own thoughts to what they read on the page. When I’m asked what my stories mean, my inclination is turn the question around: What do they mean to you?”

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Craig Lancaster’s books

Average rating: 4.11 · 21,428 ratings · 2,683 reviews · 29 distinct works • Similar authors

	600 Hours of Edward (Edward, #1) 4.12 avg rating — 12,135 ratings — published 2009 — 25 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Edward Adrift (Edward, #2) 4.22 avg rating — 4,738 ratings — published 2013	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Edward Unspooled (Edward #3) 4.36 avg rating — 1,437 ratings — published 2016	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Summer Son 3.82 avg rating — 1,357 ratings — published 2011 — 12 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Fallow Season of Hugo Hunter 3.72 avg rating — 965 ratings — published 2014 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	This Is What I Want 3.60 avg rating — 347 ratings — published 2015 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Quantum Physics and the Art of Departure 4.06 avg rating — 113 ratings — published 2011 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Julep Street 3.87 avg rating — 106 ratings — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Northward Dreams 4.12 avg rating — 43 ratings — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Jane, Divided 4.76 avg rating — 17 ratings — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Craig Lancaster's Blog

THE SUMMER SON: The Book That Came Back

The Summer Son, Craig’s second novel, came out in early 2011 and has been a hardy book, indeed. It was a Utah Book Award finalist, has been translated into French and German editions, and has been a steady seller for most of its life.

And now, it’s out in a newly edited second edition. The new release, put out by Craig’s imprint, Missouri Breaks Press, includes a hardcover version and full e-book v

Series by Craig Lancaster

Edward (3 books)
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Craig Lancaster (Goodreads Author)

4.16 avg rating — 18,312 ratings

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Write Hard, Die Free: Dispatches from the Battlefields & Barrooms of the Great Alaska Newspaper War

by Howard Weaver

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Craig Lancaster rated a book really liked it Shed Girl (A Juliet French Mystery) by Milana Marsenich (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Milana Marsenich has an admirable range—historical fiction, fiction with a literary bent, nonfiction, crime fiction, love stories—and she sure can spin a yarn. SHED GIRL, billed as a contemporary crime novel on the back cover, certainly lives up to th ...more
Jan 18, 2024 08:09PM · 3 likes · like · see review · preview book See a Problem? We’d love your help. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of Shed Girl by Milana Marsenich. Problem: Details (if other): Thanks for telling us about the problem. Not the book you’re looking for? Preview — Shed Girl by Milana Marsenich <iframe sandbox id="wrongBookKindlePreviewScreen">

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Quotes by Craig Lancaster (?)

“Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.”
― Craig Lancaster, Quantum Physics and the Art of Departure

tags: life-philosophy

153 likes

“That's the problem with belief: If you rely on it too heavily, you have a lot of picking up to do after you find out you were wrong.”
― Craig Lancaster, 600 Hours of Edward

13 likes

“The complaint lies with me, not with you. I never could find a way to make you proud of me, and at some point, I think I stopped trying. When you were here, I blamed you for that. I think now, the failure is mine... It occurs to me that death is a funny thing - not funny in a laughter sort of way, but in a twisty sort of way. It's the people who are left behind who have to grapple with the regret. The one who is gone is just gone. Wherever you are... I hope you have regret about what happened yesterday.”
― Craig Lancaster, 600 Hours of Edward

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