Scott Lax was born in Cleveland, Ohio. He attended Kent State University, graduated with a B.A. in English/American Studies from Hiram College, and studied Shakespeare at the University of Cambridge, England. He then spent fifteen years as an industrial salesman and drummer, performing with Bo Diddley, among others. In 1992, Lax began writing. He’s been a features writer and columnist for Cleveland Magazine and Northern Ohio Live, and a columnist for The Sun News.
In 1993, Lax was awarded the Bernard J. O’Keefe Scholarship in Nonfiction to the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. There, after hiking to Robert Frost’s cabin, he conceived a novel that begins and ends in a meadow. The Year That Trembled, for which he was awarded the 1998 Sewanee Writers’ Conference Walter E. Dakin Fellowship in Fiction, was called “Powerful,” and one of the year’s “milestones in fiction” by the Denver Post. The Midwest Book Review wrote, “Articulate with passion, humor and heartbreak, The Year That Trembled brings back a tumultuous time of conflict and pain endured by so many in such a diverse period in our country and our families.”
The novel’s feature film adaptation, which Lax produced, was called “The most important movie of the year” by the Ithaca Times and “memorable” by The Boston Herald. The Year That Trembled, for which Lax won four international film festival awards, is now in international DVD release. After the film, he adapted the novel for the stage. Critic Julie Hoke wrote, “A classic…kudos to playwright Scott Lax on an ambitious and successful world premier.”
In 2009, Lax won the Ohio Professional Writers first-place award for Best Essay, first-place for Best Feature Article, and second-place for Best Newspapers Series. He won the 2007 Ohio Excellence in Journalism Honorable Mention Award for best single essay. In 2008, The Hub City Writers Project of South Carolina announced The Scott Lax Prize, an annual, full-ride scholarship to the Wildacres Writers Workshop, where he taught fiction in 2007. His short story, "Sales Call," won 2nd Place for Fiction Lit's (Cleveland's Literary Center) Muse Magazine Literary Competition for 2010.
Lax, who has long been active in civic and social issues, is chairman of the Village of Chagrin Falls Arts Commission, co-chair of the Friends of Chagrin Falls Police, a frequent master judge in the Power of the Pen competition for Northeast Ohio area students, and writes pro-bono for various causes, particularly medical research.
Lax is engaged and teaches at the Chagrin Valley Writers’ Workshop, which he founded. His new novel, VILLAGE TRIANGLE, is placed with his literary agent and he is currently writing a book of short fiction. He writes a blog, “Advice for Writers.” Visit him at www.scottlax.com
