TIME CHANGE: Reading Like A Critic

Mark Athitakis is a freelance writer in Chandler, Arizona. He is a regular contributor of book reviews, essays, and interviews to the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Kirkus Reviews, and numerous other publications. His work has also appeared in the New York Times, Phoenix Magazine, and Humanities. In 2017, he published The New Midwest: A Guide to Contemporary Fiction of the Great Lakes, Great Plains, and Rust Belt (Belt Publishing), which received the Books by the Banks author award for Best Adult Nonfiction Title. He is an experienced public speaker who has been a featured guest on KJZZ, BBC Radio 4, the Diane Rehm Show, Wisconsin Public Radio, and other programs.

He has taught news writing at ASU's Cronkite School (spring 2014), and participated in panels and workshops run by the ASU's Piper Center for Creative Writing, the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC), the American Nonprofit Academy, and the Thinking Writer. For nine years he served as a board member of the NBCC, chairing its fiction award committee twice and its autobiography committee once. He currently serves on the panel of reviewers for Southwest Books of the Year, administered by the Pima County Public Library.

During his time as a Writer in Residence, he will offer writing consultations and classes at Red Mountain Library to help aspiring authors fine-tune their work. 

This project is supported by the Arizona State Library, Archives & Public Records, a division of the Secretary of State, with federal funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.