Author and former North Dakota native Debra Marquart will visit NDSU on Thursday, March 4, to give a presentation, visit with students and conduct two book signings. She also will make an appearance on Prairie Public Radio's "Hear It Now" on Friday, March 5, from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m.

Marquart will speak to Linda Helstern's Literature and the Environment class on Thursday morning. She will conduct a book signing at the NDSU Bookstore at Cityscapes from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Following a 5:30 p.m. social at the Alumni Center's Diederich Atrium and Crary Lounge, Marquart will present "Writing Your Way Home: Researching and Writing Ethnic History for 'The Horizontal World' " from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. in Diederich Atrium. She will conduct another book signing following the presentation.

Marquart will read from her work and discuss researching, uncovering and writing about German-Russian history for her memoir, "The Horizontal World: Growing Up Wild in the Middle of Nowhere," and for an in-progress roots and travel memoir about her family's migrations through Ukraine and Siberia, tentatively titled "Somewhere Else This Time Tomorrow: On Geographical Flight and Cultural Amnesia."

Marquart is a professor of English in the Master of Fine Arts program in creative writing and environment at Iowa State University. Her books include two poetry collections titled "Everything’s a Verb" and "From Sweetness," and a short story collection, "The Hunger Bone: Rock & Roll Stories," which draws on her experiences as a road musician. Marquart is a member of The Bone People, a jazz-poetry, rhythm and blues project, with whom she has released two CDs, "Orange Parade" and "A Regular Dervish."

Marquart’s memoir, "The Horizontal World: Growing Up Wild in the Middle of Nowhere," was awarded the 2007 PEN USA Creative Nonfiction Award. Marquart’s work also has received a Pushcart Prize, the Shelby Foote Nonfiction Prize from the Faulkner Society, the Elle Lettres Award from Elle Magazine, a National Endowment for the Arts Prose Fellowship and the 2009 Iowa Author's award. She’s currently at work on a novel set in Greece, titled "Among the Ruins," and a poetry collection, titled "To Break Into Blossom."

NDSU Libraries, the North Dakota Humanities Council and the Institute for Regional Studies are sponsoring Marquart's visit. For more information, contact Acacia Stuckle at 1-6596 or visit library.ndsu.edu/events.