TORRINGTON – Eastern Wyoming College professor John Nesbitt loves a good mystery.
He should. He’s written scores of them.
In his day job, Nesbitt teaches English and Spanish at EWC. His successful sideline as an author of more than 30 novels and dozens of short stories has again earned him recognition from the writing community at large.
One of his short stories, Return to Laurel, and a novella, Leaving the Lariat Trail, were selected as finalist for the Western Fictioneers Peacemaker Awards. He was also named one of three finalists for the annual Spur Award from the Western Writers of America.
Nesbitt is no stranger to winning awards for his writing. He’s a four-time Spur Award recipient, for two different novels, a short story and, last year, for his poetry. And this is his fourth time placing in the Western Fictioneers awards. Last year, Nesbitt’s book, Castle Butte, was recognized in three separate contests, including a book award for fiction from the Wyoming State Historical Society.
“Last year was a good year for me,” he said.
Like many, Nesbitt got his start writing while growing up on and around ranches and farming in the Sacramento Valley in California.
“Most writers you’ll talk to, it dates back to their grade school,” Nesbitt said. “I probably wrote more poetry up until the time I was in college than I did anything else.
“You don’t have a very formed idea sometimes when you’re younger what you’re writing. You just kind of write what you want to write.”
His first published work was a short story, West of Dancing Rock. At the time, he was splitting his efforts between fiction and scholarly articles. West of Dancing Rock was actually one of two things he had published around the same time, he said.
“I wanted to be published in both areas,” Nesbitt said. “That was how I was developing my career. The scholarly article was a bigger deal; it took longer, and it came out later.”
That first paycheck, officially making Nesbitt a “professional writer,” was for $250, he said.
“I thought that was pretty good,” Nesbitt said. “Most short stories didn’t pay that.”
While the proceeds of that story were spent long ago, the memory of seeing the title and his name on the cover of the magazine it was published in remains, he said. He was on his way to go hunting when he walked into a 7-Eleven store and, as he said, “there was my story.
“There was my title and my name on the front cover,” Nesbitt recalled. “I had practically no money because I just put it all in the gas tank. I asked the clerk, ‘would you hold a couple of these for me?’
“That was a great thrill, just to walk into a store and see something with your name on it,” he said. “That thrill never goes away.”
Also like most writers, Nesbitt is also a voracious reader. His favorite authors include Charles Dickens, A.B. Guthrie Jr. and Pulitzer prize winner Alice Munro. One curious thing about his reading preferences – none of those people write mysteries, the genre he’s probably best known for.
“I do read mystery writers, but I read little bits of everything,” he said. “If I am looking at my next writing project, maybe I’ll read things that will get me in the right frame of mind for that – things I might not read otherwise.
He came to eastern Wyoming in 1981 to take the job at EWC and he’s been here ever since. He found the job at EWC and the rural, western area to be to his liking.
“I didn’t necessarily want to get out of California, I went where I could find a good job,” Nesbitt said. “I wanted to live in a place in the American west with a low population.”
