Dave Malone

Dave Malone was born in Rolla, Missouri. In the mid-1970s when he was six, his family moved to rural Kansas to a small home that overlooked Tuttle Creek Lake. Discovering fossils along an ancient creekbed inspired an interest in history. Listening to Vincent Price’s CBS Radio Mystery Theater on his transistor inspired an interest in storytelling and the macabre. He also ate up books like the Dr. Doolittle series and Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time. In third grade, a teacher introduced haiku to a handful of eager students, and Dave was taken with this combination of math and writing. And his lifelong interest in poetry began. Encouragement from high school and college teachers to pursue a life of letters, Dave earned a bachelor’s degree from Ottawa University in 1991 and a master’s degree from Indiana State in 1994. For three years, he held a good number of fun jobs and traveled. In 1997, he came back to the Ozarks, where his family is from and serves as inspiration for much of his work. Dave is the author of 11 works of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and drama. His first book is Poems to Love and the Body (Bliss Station Publishing, 1999) and his most recent book is You Know the Ones (Golden Antelope Press, 2017). Dave’s early writing was commended for its daring, sometimes ribald, nature. His later work has been praised for its refinement, heart, and strong sense of place.