Jan MG Nerenberg is a writer, editor, artist, and calligrapher who resides in the Pacific Northwest in a 140-year-old Victorian, complete with a hidden room as well as nooks and crannies for her multitudinous grandchildren. Her husband of fifty years and counting is often seen waiting patiently outside her office door. She is a person of unpleasant disposition if disturbed when writing. Her passion is writing and teaching the art of writing as she mentors.
Her children’s fable, “Misako and the Dragons”, was published twice. The first print edition appeared in RAIN magazine, Spring 2006, Clatsop Community College, and, in the same year, in Nota Bene, the Phi Theta Kappa International Honor Society Anthology.
“Gentlemen, Please”, a non-fiction memoir, as well as various poetry selections, were presented at the Northwest Undergraduate Conference on Literature (NUCL), where Jan represented the English Department of Pacific University, Forest Grove, OR in 2007-9.
Jan worked as Fiction Editor for the publication, American Athenaeum from 2011 to 2014. Her published works include:
- The Great Caterpillar Massacre – Essay, 2012/Colossus edition
- The Witch’s Daughter: An Interview with Paula Brakston – Interview, 2013/Front Porch edition
- Things We Carry – Editorial, 2013/Things They Carry edition
- The Rollright Witch: An Interview with Artist David Gosling – Interview, 2013/Things They Carry edition.
In 2006, Jan was the recipient of the prestigious Jack Kent Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship. She graduated Magna Cum Laude at Pacific University, Forest Grove, Oregon, and completed a triple BA in Art, Creative Writing, and Literature. Following this, Jan received the JKCF Graduate Scholarship enabling her to run away from home to pursue her childhood dream of attending school in the UK. From 2012 through 2015, she researched and wrote Standing Stone at Aberystwyth University, Wales. In 2016, six months after foot reconstructive surgery she walked unaided across the stage in the Great Hall at the tender age of 69 and was awarded a PhD in English.
When not writing, she prefers to fill her time with reading, research, and her jelly-bean grandchildren. She reminds her doctor regularly that – “Age is a milestone, not a diagnosis.”
Jan lives her motto – “It is never too late to pursue your dreams