Author Summer Wood Named Recipient of $50,000 Gift of Freedom Award from A Room of...

Author Summer Wood Named Recipient of $50,000 Gift of Freedom Award from A
Room of Her Own Foundation

What can $50,000 do for one woman writer?

PLACITAS, N.M., Feb. 29 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A Room of Her Own
Foundation has recently selected Summer Wood, a short story writer and
novelist, as the fourth recipient of their $50,000 Gift of Freedom Award.

This unique award, the only of its kind in the U.S., is intended to free a
woman writer of the financial obligations of making a living, and permit her
to complete the artistic project of her choice.

Wood, of Albuquerque and San Cristobal, New Mexico will receive the cash award
in quarterly payments over two years.

"There's a different quality of thought and language that arises with the
promise of enough time to really sink into the work," Wood says. "It gives
you the chance to take the raw carbon of idea and nuance, and compress it into
something that shines powerfully."

With one novel already under her belt (Arroyo, Chronicle Books 2001), Wood
plans to spend the award period at her home in the mountains of San Cristobal,
New Mexico. She'll focus her energies on completing an ambitious new novel.

2004 Gift of Freedom recipient, Meredith Hall, used the grant period to
complete her memoir, Without a Map, which was published in April 2007 by
Beacon Press. Currently, the book is in its third printing and has spent
several weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.

A Room of Her Own Foundation (AROHO) was formed in 2000 to provide innovative
and practical arts patronage to women. "Regardless of recent gains in awards
for women writers, much work remains to be done to advance talented women,"
says Darlene Chandler Bassett, the founder of the foundation.

Since its beginning A Room of Her Own Foundation (AROHO) has given almost
$500,000 to creative women through our $50,000 Gift of Freedom awards,
scholarships, retreats, public readings, the AROHO Book Club, and our
customized web-based resource center.

Dedicated to furthering the vision of writer Virginia Woolf, AROHO continues
to change the lives of creative women by rewarding and showcasing their
important voices to our own community as well as the marketplace. AROHO is
committed to bridging the often fatal gap between a woman's economic reality
and her artistic creation. http://www.aroomofherownfoundation.org

SOURCE A Room of Her Own Foundation

Janice Fowler of A Room of Her Own Foundation, +1-505-250-6946,
bookswelove@aroomofherownfoundation.org