Kent Haruf was an acclaimed American novelist, known for his evocative portrayal of life in rural Colorado. Born on February 24, 1943, in eastern Colorado, he pursued a Bachelor of Arts in literature from Nebraska Wesleyan University in 1965, followed by a Master of Fine Arts from the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa in 1973.

Throughout his life, Haruf held a variety of jobs, including teaching English in Turkey with the Peace Corps, working at a chicken farm in Colorado, a construction site in Wyoming, a rehabilitation hospital in Colorado, a hospital in Arizona, a library in Iowa, an alternative high school in Wisconsin, and at universities in Nebraska and Illinois.

His most notable work, Plainsong, received numerous awards, including the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Maria Thomas Award in Fiction, and The New Yorker Book Award.

Kent Haruf passed away on November 30, 2014.