Annie Proulx

Annie Proulx

Annie Proulx is an American novelist, short story writer, and journalist. She has written most frequently as Annie Proulx but has also used the names E. Annie Proulx and E.A. Proulx. Proulx was the first woman to receive the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, which she won for her first novel, Postcards. Her second novel, The Shipping News, won both the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction. Her short story “Brokeback Mountain” was adapted into the award-winning film directed by Ang Lee and an opera.

Proulx was born in Norwich, Connecticut. She has English and French-Canadian ancestry and her maternal ancestors came to America in 1635. Proulx wrote her first story at the age of 10, while sick with chicken pox.
She attended Colby College but dropped out to marry her first husband. She later went back to collect and graduated with a B.A. in History from the University of Vermont. She earned her M.A. in history from Concordia University.

Proulx has lived in many places in the United States. She lived for more than 30 years in Vermont, then moved to a ranch in Saratoga, Wyoming while also frequenting northern Newfoundland. She currently lives in Port Townsend, Washington. She has married and divorced three times and has three sons and a daughter.

Proulx also has an avid interest in gardening and growing wine grapes and making cider. Her book, Sweet & Hard Cider: making it, using it, & enjoying it (which she co-wrote with Lew Nichols) is in its third edition. Her most recent non-fiction work, Fen, Bog & Swamp: A Short History of Peatland Destruction and Its Role in the Climate Crisis, was named best book of the year by The New Yorker and Literary Hub.

Recommendations For Annie Proulx

Recommended by Ellen Davis

Barkskins by Annie Proulx is a really good book. The stories, characters, and places were compelling

Recommended by Ellie Garcia

Annie Proulx is one of my favorites. She may be best known for “Brokeback Mountain” and “Shipping Ne

Share Your Recommendations

Books By Annie Proulx

Tips and Resources From Your Annie Proulx Book Club Friends:

Annie Proulx is renowned for her descriptive, yet sparse prose. Whether she’s describing the rugged beauty of the Wyoming plains or the icy harsh landscapes of Newfoundland, Proulx breathes beauty and poetry into the places she writes about. It’s against these untamed natural settings that Proulx introduces her flawed but sympathetic characters. Imperfect, complicated, tragic and empathetic, Proulx’s characters are as complex and unflinching as the landscapes she writes about. From cowboys Ennis and Jack from “Brokeback Mountain” to Quoyle, the writer with a traumatic past in The Shipping News, to the many characters permeating her Wyoming short stories, their struggles and search for meaning will make a lasting impact.

the order of the Books and all Related Books Available

All Annie Proulx’s Book Series in Order of Publication

Find the right order of the books in the series.

Wyoming Stories Books In Order

Recommendations From Annie’s Fans

Anne Tyler

Recommended by Diana Sanders

After reading The Accidental Tourist I became an Anne Tyler fan. I love her quirky characters and ge

Louise Erdrich

Recommended by Denise Foster

Louise Erdrich is one of my all time favourite authors. You need some perseverance to read her earli

Isabel Wilkerson

Recommended by Erin Jackson

“Caste“ is among the best of the non-fiction books I have ever read. I HIGHLY recommend it. There ar

Margaret Atwood

Recommended by Gillian Mitchell

Margaret Atwood’s Morning in the Burned House has the poems Half Hanged Mary as well as Sekmet, the

Tara Westover

Recommended by Emily Thomas

Tara Westover book “Educated” is a great book. A powerful book, and a resilient woman. I recommended

Amor Towles

Recommended by Effie Russell

A Gentleman in Moscow is a fabulous read! Amor Towles’ other two novels are great, too, but this one

Abraham Verghese

Recommended by Erica Martin

The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese is one of my all time favorites. It’s a slow start with lo

Kate Morton

Recommended by Dorothy Ross

Kate Morton is one of my very favourite authors. The House at Riverton is brilliant! A murder myster

Barbara Kingsolver

Recommended by Emma Campbell

Barbara Kingsolver is a wonderful writer! Her Poisonwood Bible is the best, although I love everythi

Ann Patchett

Recommended by Eliza Brown

Ann Patchett is one of my favorite authors. She never disappoints! I just listened to the audio of T

Share Your Recommendations

Recommended Books From Annie Proulx Fans

The Tennis Partner: A Doctor's Story of Friendship and Loss

My Italian Bulldozer: A Paul Stuart Novel

The Custom of the Army: An Outlander Novella

Dire Cartographies: The Roads to Ustopia and The Handmaid's Tale

What Just Happened: Notes on a Long Year

The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse

A Plague of Zombies: An Outlander Novella

The Outlandish Companion (Revised and Updated)

The Leadership Journey: How Four Kids Became President

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Home Is the Sailor: An Irish Country Doctor Story

The Boy Who Taught the Beekeeper to Read: and Other Stories

An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s

The Private Life of Spies and The Exquisite Art of Getting Even

Jan Karons Mitford Years: The First Five Novels

Ripper: The Secret Life of Walter Sickert

Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade

The Maul and the Pear Tree: The Ratcliffe Highway Murders

A Leaf on the Wind of All Hallows: An Outlander Novella

No Ordinary Time: Franklin & Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II

The Kings Of Distance: A Study of Five Great Runners

Trial By Fury: Internet Savagery and the Amanda Knox Case

Cities of Gold: A Journey Across the American Southwest

Conversations with Louise Erdrich and Michael Dorris

Jan Karons Mitford Years: Novels Six Through Nine; Plus a Father Tim Novel

“We face up to awful things because we can’t go around them, or forget them. The sooner you say ‘Yes, it happened, and there’s nothing I can do about it,’ the sooner you can get on with your own life. You’ve got children to bring up. So you’ve got to get over it. What we have to get over, somehow we do. Even the worst things.”

Annie Proulx, The Shipping News

Charlotte Ann Craig

“Annie Proulx’s writing is always compelling and she has a singular talent for evoking places and history. I’m really looking forward to reading her newest book on the world’s wetlands, Fen, Bog and Swamp.”

How can I share my favourite quotes?

See More From Book Club Friends

Sign up and log in to post, comment and join the conversation.