Robert Olmstead (Westmoreland, New Hampshire, 1954) studied at the University of Syracuse together with Raymond Carver and Tobias Wolff, and is currently a professor of creative writing at various university centers. His narrative work includes a dozen titles, including River Dogs, A Trail of Heart's Blood Wherever We Go and Coal Black Horse, with which he won the Ohaiana Book Award and Western Awards in 2008 Writers of America Spur, in addition to the Heartland Prize awarded by the Chicago Tribune. His novel Far Bright Star was included by Booklist among the ten best westerns of the decade. Critics have highlighted his ability to "translate into words the revealing nature of beauty."