Ruth Coe Chambers

Ruth Coe Chambers takes pride in her Florida panhandle roots, and her hometown of Port St. Joe has inspired much of her writing. She attended Florida State University, the University of South Florida and graduated Summa Cum Laude from California State University, Fresno. It was through creative writing classes at the University of South Florida that she found her “voice” and began writing literary fiction.

Her first novel, The Chinaberry Album, garnered praise from The New York Times Book Review and has been likened to the works of Carson McCullers and Eudora Welty. Her play, Changing Places, took first prize at the 2005 First Coast Writer’s Festival and echoes the voice of Tennessee Williams.

Today Chambers makes her home at Neptune Beach, FL, where she writes with her two dogs, Lili and Rhapsody, at her feet.

Ruth Chambers has completed the manuscript for a sequel to The Chinaberry Album. Titled Heat Lightning, the post World War II story returns to Bay Harbor, Florida, and to the events that marred the protagonist’s life.

She has recently completed a play titled She’s Wonderful and is working on a paranormal manuscript set in Apalachicola, Florida titled The House on the Forgotten Coast.