title: Bruce Holbert
text: # Bruce Holbert
  
  Bruce Holbert (born October 4, 1959) is an American writer. He is the author of the novels Lonesome Animals (Counterpoint Press), and the Hour of Lead (Counterpoint Press) which won the 2015 Washington State Book Award for Fiction and Whiskey (Farrar Straus & Giroux)
  
  ## Early life/education
  
  Holbert graduated from Lake Roosevelt High School in Coulee Dam in the spring of 1978, then attended Eastern Washington University where he graduated with a degree in English/Education in 1983. He graduated with an MFA from the University of Iowa Writers Workshop in 1990
  
  In 1982, Holbert inadvertently shot and killed one of his friends in a gun accident. Charges against Holbert were eventually dropped. Holbert has stated that he remains "numbed by guilt."
  
  