Abbreviated Biography

 A 2006 inductee into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame, and a 2009 recipient of the Governor’s Award in   the   Humanities,  Terry  Kay   has  been  further  honored  in  2015  by  the  Atlanta  Writers  Club’s designation of its annual fiction award as The Terry Kay Prize for Fiction.

 A native of Hart County  in  northeast Georgia,  Kay  has  been a sports  writer and film/theater critic (Atlanta Journal-Constitution), a public relations executive and a corporate officer. He is the author of eighteen published books, including the 2020 release of The Forever Wish of Middy Sweet. 

His  other  works  include The King Who Made Paper Flowers, Song  of  the  Vagabond  Bird,  The  Seventh  Mirror,  The  Greats  of  Cuttercane,  Bogmeadow's Wish, The Book of Marie, To Dance With the White Dog, The Valley of Light, Taking Lottie Home, The Kidnapping of Aaron Greene, Shadow Song, The Runaway, Dark Thirty, After Eli, The Year the Lights Came On, To Whom the Angel Spoke, as well as a book of essays, Special K: The Wisdom of Terry Kay.

Three of his novels have been produced as Hallmark Hall of Fame movies –To Dance With the White Dog, The Runaway and  The  Valley  of  Light.   Additionally,  a Japanese film based on To Dance With the White Dog was produced, and a staged reader's  version of the book was presented in Japan in 2016.

His books have been published in more than twenty foreign languages, with To Dance With the White Dog selling two million copies in Japan. 

An essayist and regional Emmy-winning screenwriter as well as a novelist, Kay's work has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies. 

LaGrange College and Mercer University have recognized his work with honorary doctorate degrees. 

In 2011, Kay was presented the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Georgia Writers Association. He has received the Georgia Author of the Year award four times and in 2004 was presented with the Townsend Prize, considered the state's top literary award. In October, 2006, he received the prestigious Appalachian Heritage Writer's Award from Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, WV. In March of 2007, he was presented the Brooke Baker Award from Dunwoody Library honoring his career as a writer.

Also in 2007, Kay was presented the Stanley W. Lindberg Award, named for the late editor of The Georgia Review and considered one of the state's most prestigious literary honors, given for an individual's significant contribution to the preservation and celebration of Georgia's literary heritage.

A native of Hart County, GA, Kay and his wife now reside in Athens, GA.