A SENSE OF PLACE

Mark Spencer is Associate Vice Chancellor for Program Development, Assessment, and Distance Learning at the University of Arkansas Monticello (UAM).  He was previously the Dean of the School of Arts and Humanities at UAM. During his time as Dean, he led the revision of curricula in all the disciplines of Arts and Humanities and the creation of new baccalaureate programs in Jazz Studies, Modern Languages, and Liberal Arts, as well as the creation of nationally recognized innovative graduate programs: the online Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, the low-residency Master of Music in Jazz Studies, the online Master of Fine Arts in Debate and Communication, and the online Master of Arts in English with four distinct concentration areas. 

e also teaches in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at UAM. Mark is the author of the bestselling nonfiction book A Haunted Love Story: the Ghosts of the Allen House; the novels An Untimely Frost, Ghost Walking, The Weary Motel, The Masked Demon, Love and Reruns in Adams County; the short-story collections Trespassers and Wedlock; the history book Images of America: Monticello; and the how-to-write-fiction book Fiction Club. Episodes of five TV shows are based on A Haunted Love Story: the Ghosts of the Allen House. He has received the Faulkner Society Faulkner Award for the Novel, the Omaha Prize for the Novel, the Bradshaw Book Award, the Cairn Short Fiction Award, and four Special Mentions in Pushcart Prize. He and his family live in the famously haunted Allen House.

He attended the PhD program in English at Oklahoma State University; received his Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Green State University (Ohio); and obtained his Bachelor of Arts in English literature from the University of Cincinnati.