About the Book
A debut novel that spins towards a single moment, a plane crash on New Year's Day, and then away from it, as the families of the victims navigate intertwined paths in the wake of the tragedy Richard MacMurray, a cable news talking head, is paid handsomely to pontificate on the issues of the moment. On New Year's Day he is scheduled to appear on a prominent Sunday-morning talk show, but as he awaits the broadcast, the program is interrupted by news of a jet airline crash in Dallas killing everyone on board. Richard becomes aware that his sister Mary Beth was aboard the flight, leaving her six-year-old son Gabriel behind. Richard, his only living relative, must take Gabriel in.Panorama dramatizes the ever-widening impact of a single moment over the span of one day--on the victims and their loved ones, but also the plane's mechanic, the airport janitor, and casual observers such as the teenager in a dingy motel who captures the plane's final moments on video.
About the Author
Steve Kistulentz is the author of the novel PANORAMA, to be published in March 2018 by Little, Brown & Co. He has also published two collections of poetry, Little Black Daydream (2012) and The Luckless Age (2010) .
Kistulentz was born in Washington, DC. He earned a BA in English from the College of William and Mary, an MA from the Johns Hopkins University, an MFA from the Iowa Writer's Workshop, and a PhD from the Florida State University.
His narrative nonfiction - mostly on the subject of popular culture - has appeared widely in journals.
Prior to writing, he spent nearly 20 years in national politics in Washington DC, directing political strategy for corporations mostly in the transportation and infrastructure areas.
Kistulentz's poems work against the pervasive influence of nostalgia, occupying the space between histories; they often focus on what Yeats called "counter-truth," the gap between the commonplace understanding of an event and its more nuanced or even imagined reinterpretation. Mike Krutel, writing in the American Book Review, compared the "lived-in landscapes" of The Luckless Age's poems to John Berryman's dream songs.
Kistulentz's honors include the Benjamin Saltman Award for The Luckless Age, as well as fellowship support from Writers at Work, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and an individual award from the Mississippi Arts Commission. He has taught at the Johns Hopkins University; the University of Iowa, where he was the Joseph and Ursil Callan Scholar; and the Florida State University, where he was an Edward and Marie C. Kingsbury Fellow for Excellence in Thought. He directs the graduate creative writing program at Saint Leo University in Florida.
