NEWS: Eileen Heyes's book about Piedmont farm life, Bountiful Red Acres: Two Farms, Two Families, and a Year on the Land, has been chosen by North Carolina Humanities as its 2024 Great Read for children. Along with the adult title Those We Thought We Knew by David Joy, Bountiful (illustrated by Dare Coulter) will represent North Carolina at the August 2024 Library of Congress National Book Festival in D.C. The state's Department of Natural and Cultural Resources published the book, in association with the N.C. African American Heritage Commission. The story follows the Hauser and Sawyers families through the year 1900, as they farm their patch of earth in Surry County, a site now known as Horne Creek Living Historical Farm.

You can order the book from UNC Press, your local independent bookstore (Eileen's is Quail Ridge Books), or Amazon. It's written for third- to eighth-graders, or for anyone who's interested in what it was like growing up on a farm at the turn of the 20th century.

Eileen says: "I am thrilled and incredibly grateful to have my work chosen for this honor. Thank you, N.C. Humanities!"

********

Eileen Heyes is the author of four nonfiction books for young readers and two middle-grade mystery novels. Her books have been honored by the New York Public Library, the Society of School Librarians International, Mystery Writers of America and the Child Study Council. Her current writing focus is North Carolina history.

She wrote and edited at newspapers for 30 years while trying to decide what she wanted to be when she grew up. In learning the craft of storytelling, she has studied screenwriting and improv, volunteered in the street cast of a Renaissance Faire, earned a certificate in Documentary Arts from the Center for Documentary Studies, and gotten her master's degree in English from N.C. State University.

Over the years, she has taken it all back into the classroom as an instructor in Duke University's OLLI program, a writer-in-residence with the United Arts Council of Wake County, a camp leader with Cary Academy’s SummerQuest program, and a creator of two student newspapers. Originally from Los Angeles, she has lived, worked, gardened and raised her sons in Raleigh for more than three decades.

Eileen is available for school and library visits, presentations to groups of any size, and manuscript editing and critiquing.

Learn more and find contact information at Eileen's website, www.eileenheyes.com, or visit and like her author Facebook page.