William Kennedy at the NYS Writers Institute in 2011

William Kennedy, founder and executive director of the New York State Writers Institute, is the author of the new novel, Changó's Beads and Two-Tone Shoes (October 2011). A tale of revolutionary intrigue, heroic journalism, crooked politicians, drug-running gangsters, Albany race riots, and the improbable rise of Fidel Castro, the novel follows the epic adventures of Albany journalist Daniel Quinn and his unpredictable Cuban wife Renata, during the turbulent 1950s and 1960s. Kennedy received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1983 for the novel Ironweed. His most recent novel was Roscoe (2002), which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award.

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