Dana Jennings is an American journalist, who is an editor

Editing

Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...

 at The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, as well as an author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

. His books include What a Difference a Dog Makes: Big Lessons on Life, Love and Healing from a Small Pooch; Sing Me Back Home: Love, Death and Country Music; Me, Dad and Number 6; Lonesome Standard Time; Women of Granite; and Mosquito Games.

At the Times since 1993, Jennings has written and/or edited for Sports, Arts and Leisure, New Jersey weekly, Travel, the City section, Education Life, Culture and The New York Times Book Review

The New York Times Book Review

The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...

.

Education and career

Jennings was born in rural New Hampshire

New Hampshire

New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...

 in October 1957. His parents were 17 when he was born, and neither of them attended school past the 8th grade. Jennings was the first in his family to graduate from high school (valedictorian

Valedictorian

Valedictorian is an academic title conferred upon the student who delivers the closing or farewell statement at a graduation ceremony. Usually, the valedictorian is the highest ranked student among those graduating from an educational institution...

 at Sanborn Regional High, class of 1975), and later worked his way through the University of New Hampshire

University of New Hampshire

The University of New Hampshire is a public university in the University System of New Hampshire , United States. The main campus is in Durham, New Hampshire. An additional campus is located in Manchester. With over 15,000 students, UNH is the largest university in New Hampshire. The university is...

. Jennings graduated from UNH in 1980 and returned there for a week in April, 2010 as a Donald Murray Visiting Journalist.

Over the years Jennings has worked at the Manchester Union Leader

New Hampshire Union Leader

The New Hampshire Union Leader is the daily newspaper of Manchester, the largest city in the state of New Hampshire. As of September 2010 it had a daily circulation of 48,342 and the circulation of its Sunday paper, the New Hampshire Sunday News, was 63,991. It was founded in 1863.It was called...

, The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....

and The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

. Jennings has also published six books, including a children's book, and three novels that depict rural

Rural

Rural areas or the country or countryside are areas that are not urbanized, though when large areas are described, country towns and smaller cities will be included. They have a low population density, and typically much of the land is devoted to agriculture...

 life in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

.

Jennings's first non-fiction book is about country music

Country music

Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...

 and seamlessly weaves personal anecdotes together with the vice and gruffness of "classic country."

Diagnosed with advanced and aggressive prostate cancer in 2008, Jennings has been writing a weekly column for the Well blog on nytimes.com since November 2008. One of his most popular posts led to his book 'What a Difference a Dog Makes', which was published in November 2010.

Personal

Jennings currently resides in Upper Montclair, New Jersey

Upper Montclair, New Jersey

Upper Montclair is northern Montclair, which is usually reckoned as everything north of Watchung Avenue. Upper Montclair takes up approximately one third of Montclair, New Jersey-Education:...

, with his wife. They have two grown sons.

Novels

• Lonesome Standard Time. New York: Harcourt, 1996. ISBN 015100188X ISBN 978-0151001880
• Women of Granite. New York: Harcourt, 1992. ISBN 0151983674 ISBN 978-0151983674
• Mosquito Games. Ticknor & Fields, 1989. ASIN: B000ONQ4K8

For Children

• With Goro Sasaki (illustrator). Me, Dad and Number 6. Gulliver Books, 1997. ISBN 0152000852 ISBN 978-0152000851

Non-fiction

• Sing Me Back Home: Love, Death and Country Music. (FSG, 2008)http://us.macmillan.com/singmebackhome
• What a Difference a Dog Makes: Big Lessons on Life, Love and Healing from a Small Pooch. (Doubleday, 2010)

Print journalism

• ESSAY: "Religion Is Less A Birthright and More a Good Fit" by Dana Jennings. "The New York Times", 2 March 2008.
• Review of Awesome Bill from Dawsonville: My Life in NASCAR
  NASCAR
  The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing is a family-owned and -operated business venture that sanctions and governs multiple auto racing sports events. It was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1947–48. As of 2009, the CEO for the company is Brian France, grandson of the late Bill France Sr...
  
  by Bill Elliott
  Bill Elliott
  William Clyde "Bill" Elliott , also known as Awesome Bill from Dawsonville or Million Dollar Bill, is a part-time driver and former champion of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. Elliott was inducted into the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America on August 15, 2007. He won the 1988 NASCAR Winston Cup...
  
  with Chris Millard. The New York Times, 11 February 2007.
• "ESSAY: After All These Years, A Red-Headed Stranger." The New York Times, 3 July 2005.
• "New York Action Hero." The New York Times, 23 November 2003.
• "MEDIA: At House of Comics, a Writer's Champion." The New York Times, 15 September 2003.
• "MUSIC: Treasured Moments, Living On in Boxed Sets." The New York Times, 10 February 2002.
• "Too Close for Comfort, and Too Far; A Murky Tunnel Full of Buses and What-Ifs." The New York Times, 30 September 2001.
• "The Magic of Comics! While Batman Turns 64, A Fan Goes Back to 9." The New York Times, 27 August 2003.
• "MUSIC: They Have a Right to Sing the Blues, and a Reason." The New York Times, 13 August 2000.
• "In Bayou Country, Music Is Never Second Fiddle." The New York Times, 22 November 1998.
• "Spanning the Globe: 60 Years With Lomax." The New York Times, 13 April 1997.
• "Gathering In a Reaper's Harvest of Song." The New York Times, 13 April 1997.
• "The Juilliard Of Bluegrass Music." The New York Times, 5 January 1997.
• "Remembrance of Things Fast." The New York Times, 20 August 1995.
• "POP MUSIC: Bluegrass, Straight and Pure, Even if the Money's No Good." The New York Times, 23 April 1995.
• "BACKTALK: A Son Grows a Little Older, a Father Grows a Little Younger." The New York Times, 19 June 1994.